A while back I wrote about how not to be an expert. Today I read the best explanation I’ve seen in a long time on why not to be an expert in, of all places, the journal Nature. But you don’t have to take my word for it–read it yourself.

–Katherine

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Imagine you have to explain puberty to a kid. But you have to write it down in advance, so you don’t get to listen or see any body language. And wait–it’s not just one kid. It’s thousands. And you’re not just speaking for  yourself, but an institution you care about.

You can probably imagine why I procrastinated over writing about puberty for the Being Human exhibit. The topic was embarrassing, and my attempts to explain it were worse.

That’s where I stayed stuck until I realized I was trying to do the wrong job. The science centre isn’t a place that would ”explain puberty to a kid.” I had to find a way to include information about puberty without acting like the expert.

I considered trying a pilot (mocking up a version of the exhibit for people to try–our usual way of figuring out what to do), but pilots show how people react to an activity. I needed to know what people thought was important. I needed to crowdsource.

Crowdsourcing can mean a lot of things. The website Kiva.org crowdsources philanthropy by connecting people who are willing to lend money with aspiring entrepreneurs in developing countries. Threadless.com solicits t-shirt designs from users and sells the ones that get the most votes. Then there’s wikipedia. [All of these examples are from Jeff Howe’s book Crowdsourcing, which goes into way more detail than I can here.]

I decided to keep it simple. Being Human was scheduled to be the focus of the next Market Collective, so I made a big sign reading, “what should everyone know about being a teen?” and put out a thick stack of cards suggesting topics (zits, hair, hygiene, voice changing, hard-ons, periods, hormones and crushes–somehow I forgot to include breasts) along with straight pins so people could stick them on the wall.

The resulting notes were insightful, emotional, practical and funny. Here’s how we used them in the final graphic describing puberty for guys (there’s another for girls):

We also added a projector to the puberty area in Being Human and scanned the rest of the cards to make a slideshow.

Piloting and crowdsourcing have a lot in common. They tap into visitors’ knowledge and ideas. If you keep it simple they don’t require much time or money. They do require humility.

The differences are important. Piloting is all about how. How do people react? How does the exhibit work (or not)? How could it be improved? Crowdsourcing is better at what. What do people care about? What perspectives have you missed?

Knowing what question you’re trying to answer determines how to proceed. To pilot, mock up the final exhibit experience. When you’re crowdsourcing it’s often better not to approximate the final exhibit. When people perceive themselves as making an exhibit, they clam up or try to sound like a ‘science centre.’ But when visitors are intrigued by your questions and feel safe enough to respond honestly, they can be the source of some brilliant ideas.

–Katherine

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At the end of the work day my husband will often pick me up to carpool home.  Often, I’m not ready to leave just yet; sometimes having to finish sending one last email, or in this case – working on the floor during the last week of Titanic.  He usually sits patiently in his truck listening to music or tidying up his paperwork.  That is, unless he knows we’re up to something big.

As I came off the floor finishing my shift; I took a look around the parking lot and noticed he wasn’t in his truck.  And so, I continued around the parking lot to our loading dock where I suspected Alex and Dana were up to something.  And something big  – Alex is testing some demonstration experiences, and today it was about exploding hydrogen balloons.  With rocket ignition.

Of course my husband is right in the middle of the action, helping to figure out the technique of ignition.  I asked how it was going, he replied, “I am SCHOOLING these two in science!”.  And under my breath, I murmured, “Well, they’re doing their job”.

Alex and Dana are not inept when it comes to science, nor were they playing dumb for my husband’s sake.  They were just doing their job well:  facilitating an experience.  Facilitating it so that my husband felt like he had viable answers, he had the opportunity to experiment and try his ideas, and all the while they were keeping the environment safe for him to test out these ideas.

Even though science demonstrations typically have a staff member displaying all the cool and dangerous tricks on stage; I have a feeling you’ll be amazed at what Alex is thinking up.  A demonstration where every bang, boom and whiz is performed by *gasp* a visitor in the audience.  Where visitors who wants to participate will have a chance to freely explore and test out their own experiments on stage.  I like to imagine the visitor who leaves the Presentation Theatre saying, “I’ve never got to do that before in my life!”.  Alex, don’t take it personally when someone proclaims they ‘were schooling you’ on the job.  It’s just a sign you’re doing a great job.

-stacey.

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One of the amazing things for me about the process we are working through to develop the galleries for this new science centre is how much iteration is allowed for in the process. By this I mean that the exhibits, the layouts, the “design” and even the voice of the writing go through many many variations as they evolve into what you are going to see on opening day. Even then, we are trying to leave enough open ended elements so that it can continue to evolve (and so that our visitors want to come back).

I thought it might be interesting to share a quick example of how much the voice (the person you might imagine speaking what is written on panels in the gallery) for the Earth and Sky gallery has evolved. A few months ago we often described the gallery “like cutting a line from the bedrock to the aurora and being amazed by the experience of everything in between.” Some of the words associated with it were “poetic” and “beautiful.” This was a good starting point, but as we started to play that tone out something didn’t fit. The problem it turns out was that we were biasing it too much  – we are honoring our visitors if we give them space to decide what their own reactions are.  The kind of experiences we hope to cultivate in the gallery are still going to offer the possibility of noticing things that are poetic or beautiful, but we’ve tried to think of it as starting a conversation, not directing one.

As a result of this I’m now thinking of the ES graphic panels as a conversation. Imagine walking through your neighborhood (either in the city or the country) with someone you respect, and who respects you (we’ve been calling them an “elder” – like a grandparent maybe)  and having a conversation be sparked by a specific observation about the physical world. That leads to a broader “insight” (like a piece of wisdom but not too hokey) and the chance to explain more if you want. I’ll post more about this as we go, but right now I’ll leave with an example from our experiments (this may or may not end up in the final text)

-Kris

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