Some Placement Reflections...

Hi all, this is Martha! I’m a museum studies student at the University of Glasgow, and I’ve been spending the last few months completing a student placement with Glencoe Folk Museum! As the placement drew to a close, I wanted to reflect and look back at some of the things I’ve been up to...

I completed my placement remotely from Glasgow which means that I haven’t had the chance to physically be in Glencoe while I’ve been working with the team. Nevertheless, Glencoe is somewhere I love visiting and although I haven’t been there over my time with GFM, I absolutely plan on visiting again… hopefully when the museum reopens its doors!

Learning about the museum’s redevelopment has been a lot of fun and has given me such a unique insight into the museum sector which I feel very lucky to have gained. There are so many fab projects going on within the redevelopment, and the team are doing a brilliant job! I have been working closely with Parris (Learning and Engagement Officer at GFM) who has been brilliant at helping me along the way and, outside of working on my own projects and content, I’ve been able to get a glimpse at some of the things that she has worked on including the brilliant pop-up museums which you all may have seen before!

The work I’ve been doing has been mostly centred around the project of creating new ‘Explorer Backpacks’, which are sensory kits - to support visiting families and groups, including any ASN individuals - that aim to make the museum more fun and comfortable to visit. At the start of my placement I also set two different goals to work towards while doing this project. These were to develop my skills in digital media and outreach, and also to work on some project skills including research and creating resources.

The beginning of my placement was largely research and learning based. I spent a while getting to know the ins and outs of the museum’s redevelopment, collection, and stories. I loved reading through the collections page and blogs that have been posted. I particularly loved learning about Corrag and Glencoe’s rich folkloric history…  recently I have even managed to squeeze in reading Susan Fletcher’s ‘Witch Light’ in amongst everything else! I also loved learning about GFM’s founders and seeing some of Barbara Fairweather’s drawings of Amber (who has become my favourite wee mascot)! At the beginning of my placement the museum was described to me as ‘quirky’ and it has been exactly that, which I have found so refreshing and fun to engage with.

While getting to know the museum itself, I also started researching and gaining an understanding of accessibility, inclusion, and best practice for sensory resources. I looked at various examples of resources and platforms for guidance. The SEND in Museums platform, created by Sam Bowen, was extremely helpful and valuable for enhancing my own understanding of supporting inclusion, but also for demonstrating approaches to actually creating resources. I also got to head out for a day to see what examples of sensory kits and resources I could find in museums across Glasgow! Since my placement has been completed predominantly online, this was particularly valuable for allowing me to see some existing resources in person and to briefly chat to staff about what their sensory kits provide.

After starting to form a basis of research, I began to plan the contents and themes of the backpacks. In terms of themes, we decided on using some of the museum’s mascots: Amber, Hamish, and Corrag! These mascots can act as fun companions for exploring the museum and each theme lends itself to slightly different focuses and age ranges or needs. Having themes in place meant I could start planning the contents more firmly and I began sourcing lots of different items like sensory fidget toys and soft toy explorer pals!

I was then able to move on to creating paper resources, which has been one of the most enjoyable elements for me and really let me work on my digital skills like I was aiming to. I’ve been working on lots of resources including a visual plan and different activity cards which has been a lot of fun and has let me experiment creatively, I even had opportunities to get some old drawing skills out and put them to use again!

I got to work on my digital skills and outreach a bit more by creating some social media posts which introduced the backpacks project briefly. As part of this I even headed to Kelvingrove in Glasgow (with the help of Amber) to see what connections I could find to Glencoe and the Highlands. This was a really nice chance to learn a bit more about Glencoe and Scottish history and reflect on all the stories I’ve been learning about here at GFM, and I was surprised by just how many connections there were that I hadn’t noticed before!

The backpacks project has been both enjoyable and insightful to work on, and the nature of a resource like this is that it is something the museum will be able to continue to improve on as people start using the backpacks and giving their feedback. I have also helped to create some feedback forms which can be used when the resource rolls out so that these backpacks can continue to develop and be something which makes GFM more inclusive.

I have absolutely loved completing both this project and my placement more widely with GFM and cannot thank the team enough for all their help and support. I look forward to keeping up with what is going on here and cannot wait to see how the redeveloped museum looks when it is complete!

-This blog was written by Martha McTear; as part of her work placement module for her MSc Museum Studies course at University of Glasgow between January-April 2025.

The GFM Team would like to say a heartfelt thank you to Martha for all her hard work. We were impressed by Martha’s existing skills and knowledge around accessibility and creating new resources. Her creative flare, attention to detail and keen eye for what looks good whilst working within our branding guidelines, meant the family-friendly resources she made were fun, age and level appropriate, polished and practical. Martha completed all her objectives and exceeded our expectations! Her work has resulted in us now having 6 complete family-friendly sensory explorer backpacks which we can provide once we reopen. We can’t wait to roll out these colourful, cute resources.

This project was possible due to working in partnership with the team at University of Glasgow; we would like to thank them for the opportunity to work with early-career professionals.

- Parris Joyce, Learning and Engagement Officer