ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions.
*****************************************************************************

Brian,

What is the target age range for your museum?

We recently installed our newest exhibit, Healthyville (geared towards
children 10 and younger). We thought it would be great to have an acutal
microscope (that was modified/encased so that it couldn't easily break) and
have it attached to a monitor so that families/groups could view together.
We spent a good amount of time working with our fabricator to build this.
After testing, modifying, testing again and modifying again, it never stood
up in an exhibit environment.

We are currently using a Wentzscope and a slide show (created in Flash) on
the monitor we originally had hooked up to the microscope. They run
independently. We are really happy with the end result and visitors are
both using the Wentzscope and watching specimens on the TV (ones that we
can't present with the Wentzscope).

Feel free to contact me if you have any other questions.
Sheri
____________________________________
Sheri Cifaldi
Director of Exhibits
Stepping Stones Museum for Children
Mathews Park, 303 West Avenue
Norwalk, Connecticut 06850
203 899 0606, ext 234














     To:  [log in to unmask]
     cc:
     bcc:
     Subject:  Microscopes in Musuems
Brian Hostetler <[log in to unmask]>
Sent by: Informal Science Education Network
<[log in to unmask]>
03/27/2007 12:11 PM MST
Please respond to Informal Science Education Network         <font size
=-1></font>



















ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related
institutions.
*****************************************************************************

Hello All-

We are putting together an exhibit revolving around Pathology Labs and the
work they do.  As part of this we are looking at using microscopes for
visitors to try without staff supervision.  Does anyone have experience
using unsupervised microscopes in an exhibit, and if so what have you done
to effectively allow visitors to use them without breaking them into
thousands of tiny bits?  Are actual microscopes worth the maintenance and
upkeep trouble?  Or should we replace them with images on an LCD screen?

Any reply and/or insights would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

Brian Hostetler
Exhibits and Programs Coordinator
The YouZeum
Columbia, MO
www.youzeum.org



____________________________________________________________________________________
Don't get soaked.  Take a quick peek at the forecast
with the Yahoo! Search weather shortcut.
http://tools.search.yahoo.com/shortcuts/#loc_weather

***********************************************************************
More information about the Informal Science Education Network and the
Association of Science-Technology Centers may be found at
http://www.astc.org.

The ISEN-ASTC-L email list is powered by LISTSERVR software from L-Soft. To
learn more, visit
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html.

To remove your e-mail address from the ISEN-ASTC-L list, send the
message  SIGNOFF ISEN-ASTC-L in the BODY of a message to
[log in to unmask]

***********************************************************************
More information about the Informal Science Education Network and the
Association of Science-Technology Centers may be found at http://www.astc.org.

The ISEN-ASTC-L email list is powered by LISTSERVR software from L-Soft. To learn more, visit
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html.

To remove your e-mail address from the ISEN-ASTC-L list, send the
message  SIGNOFF ISEN-ASTC-L in the BODY of a message to
[log in to unmask]