“From the Field to the Museum”: A New Educational Outreach Program at Vedi Fortress, Armenia

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

This field report recounts our newly realized collaborative children’s educational workshop at the Vedi Fortress in Armenia. In June 2022, the Ararat Plain Southeast Archaeological Project (APSAP) partnered with the National Gallery of Armenia and the Armenian Heritage Development Fund to run our first “From the Field to the Museum” Summer School. Children ages 10–14 from urban Yerevan and the local towns of Vedi, Urtsadzor, and Ararat participated over the course of four days, learning the life cycle of an artifact from the ground to the display. The summer school allowed participants to excavate on site, conduct lab work and analysis, restore their finds in the National Gallery, and create an exhibition of their finds in the museum. Initial formal and informal assessment of the program indicates it was effective and well-received. This program was a true collaboration between an archaeological team, local museum, and local heritage organization, and thus strove to meet the needs and desires of the community from its inception. Integrating the archaeological and museological process in children’s education presents an opportunity to demonstrate the deep value of archaeological heritage and will, hopefully, allow these young students to make strides toward becoming stewards of their country’s past.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37024.0