A group of lucky children from Caerphilly County Borough recently had the opportunity to take control of their county museum at the Winding House in New Tredegar.
During August, members of “My Museum!” Young Volunteers project took part in an exciting and innovative free new activity, taking over part of the museum’s West Gallery.
The young people – aged 9-12 years – became mini-Curators for the week, discovering how museums look after their collections and picking a selection of objects to go on display in the gallery. The objects were based around the theme of leisure and social life and the children also developed their learning and knowledge of this topic with fun activities comparing games and toys from today with those of the past.
The culmination of the week’s activity was the redesign of two exhibition cases in the museum’s main gallery. The children not only chose the objects for display, they also helped decide how they should be laid out in the exhibition cases, before seeing them officially unveiled in front of friends and family on 20th August.
Lifelong Learning Officer, Dean Veall stated, “we were keen to refresh some of our exhibition cases and wanted to ensure local community involvement. The children who took part in the project were so enthusiastic and we are thrilled that they have helped us add interesting new displays to the gallery.”
The objects selected include a rag doll dating from 1897 which belonged to a child from Bedwas and one of the first ever personal computers from the 1980s. They will remain on display in the West Gallery of the Winding House.
