LIFE-SIZED casts of a Muttaburrasaurus skull, a Triceratops horn, teeth, a section of a frill and actual prehistoric fossils, were just some of the objects presented by Museums Victoria to students at Hamilton North Primary School last Wednesday.
Hands-on interaction, complemented by digital resources, provided a rich learning opportunity for the students, who were encouraged to make scientific observations, including how dinosaurs hatch and grow.
The students delighted in the actual size of the cast replicas, which helped them grasp identifying features of dinosaurs.
They showed great interest in the stories of the dinosaurs’ survival, the different places they lived and where their basic needs, including food, water and shelter, were met.
Handling the dinosaur bones, fossils, replicas and listening to the narratives from Museum Victoria’s learning facilitator, Ryan McCann, helped the students go back in time and imagine a world where dinosaurs existed on earth.
The travelling ‘museum in a van’ outreach program is supported by the Department of Education and Training and provides students in regional Victorian primary and secondary schools the opportunity to learn more about dinosaurs and fossils.
This enables children throughout regional Victoria to learn about ‘traces of the past’ and access museum specimens, who would not otherwise be able to get to Melbourne to visit the museum.
Museums Victoria’s outreach manager said the outreach program was “a fantastic opportunity for our regional areas to give children a little taste of what the museum is all about”.
“The sessions are interactive, hands-on, educational, and most importantly, lots of fun,” they said.
“The incursions are an excellent avenue for the museum to connect with children from our regional areas and get them interested in science and history from a young age.”
Melbourne Museum educators were also welcomed into the classroom at Hamilton Parklands Special School last Monday, as part of the ‘Positive Start in 2022’ initiative.
The ‘museum in a van’ program has engaged with more than 13,000 children around the state in 2022.
