The 2013 Mooshme Year in Review

I don’t care if it sounds trite – I am equally amazed and excited that we are just about to hit the end of the first full year of Moosha Moosha Mooshme. Rather that try to summarize all the lesson learned over the past twelve months, reading the tea leaves for patterns and signals in the intersection of digital media and museum-based learning, I figured I’d take the easy way out and highlight YOUR top selections over the past year year.

Using site stats based on your traffic to the site (along with some rather comment-heavy spambots) prepare yourself for the first annual Mooshme Year in Review, based on the most visited post within each site category. (But before I lose you in a sea of links, please remember that the most important thing to me about this blog is you – your thoughtful responses, your on-point critiques, your sharing the ones that tough you with others. A blog is a dialogue. Please take a moment or two to comment below about what you find useful about this blog and what you’d like to see even more of in 2014).

From My Work:
“The Launch of Minecraft at the Museum of Natural History” (9.6.2013)

The most popular post on the site this year, it marked the transition between the early phase of our experiments with Minecraft (revealing, for the first time, the video below, documenting FoodCraft which, at 1,050 views, is the most watched video on Mooshme) and beginning the current era where we offer Minecraft at the Museum. Minecraft + Informal Science Learning = Hotness.

(read more in From My Work…)

Critiques:
“Raising the Bar: The Launch of Smithsonian’s X 3D” (11.13.2013)

I was delighted that of all my critiques this is the one that received the most attention, focusing on the groundbreaking digital fabrication efforts at the Smithsonian. I get disappointed that so many of my critiques take my colleagues to task for not raising the bar higher. I hope I am learning to be more thoughtful and supportive, more understanding of the constraints we have to face, while still keeping expectations high. This particular critique, however, thrilled me to the bone to write. As I concluded the post, written from their live event in D.C., “While I am excited about what the Smithsonian has done (and will do) I am more excited by the disruptive affect it will have across the museum landscape, raising the bar and expanding the possibility space for all.”

(read more in Critiques…)

Interviews:
“Interview with Dirk vom Lehn: Using Technology in Museums to Support Learning Through Social Interaction” (10.22.2012)

One of my first interviews on the site, with sociologist Dirk vom Lehn at King’s College London, certainly has a long tail! Even though it is from 2012,  it was the most visited throughout 2013. It explored Dirk’s research areas (Museums, Interaction & Technology). As I was new to the museum world at the time of the interview, it was instrumental in helping me to develop an understanding of common pitfalls in tech-supported museum experiences and how to keep the eye on the prize: connecting people with the museum content and the people around them.

(read more in Interviews…)

Practice:
“Capturing Dinosaurs – The Beginning” (7.9.2013)

The most popular post describing innovative practices in digital media and learning in museums was this first description of our Capturing Dinosaurs program, a summer camp in which teens learned comparative fossil anatomy through digital fabrication. This post talked about digital badges, our use of the card game Bone Wars, their visit behind the scenes to the Fossil Reptiles Collection, how they digitally scanned real fossils, and more. It was an intense program, and this post does an excellent job both describing it in detail and sharing some lovely images.

(read more in Practice…)

Theory:
“Both Sides of the Screen: Museums Seeking Balance in a Digital Age” (7.13.2013)

You selected this post, a reblog from my column at DMLcentral, which reflected on how we all struggle to balance our attention between the “two sides of the screen,” and how museums are currently facing the same struggle. “The more museums can empower their visitors to control their attention,” I concluded, “to be in charge of how the digital mediates their experience, the more museums can contribute towards helping us all find the balance we seek.”

(read more in Theory…)

Conferences:
“Scientists, Dinosaurs, Origami… Oh My! Event Schedue for AMNH at Maker Faire NY” (9.18.2013)

We had the pleasure of going to a lot of conferences and public events this year, from Games for Change, the Digital Media and Learning Conference, and the Games Learning and Society Conference, to ComicCon, our own Night at the Museum and more. But one of the most awesome, in my opinion, was the most awesome in yours as well: World Maker Faire NY 2013. This post summarized our audacious plans to bring The Dino Skull Challenge, Q&A with 11 Museum Scientists and Staff, The Can’t Touch This Table, Make Science With 3D Printers, Origami and more.

(read more in Conferences…)

Videos:
“Students Use 3D Printing to Reconstruct Dinosaurs” (8.5.2013)

The following video produced by the Museum highlighted this past summer’s Capturing Dinosaurs program, and is about to surpass 6,500 views in six months. For me, it never gets old. Enjoy.

Tweets:

Finally, from my Twitter account for this blog, some of my favorite tweets about our work here: