Formative Evaluation

A science center was preparing a current exhibit to travel to other sites. Before starting, Institute staff undertook a formative evaluation to study visitor feedback and recommend areas of improvement to the exhibit.

We asked visitors:

Which were the most popular parts of the exhibit?
Which related most clearly to the overall theme?
Were any components confusing, underused, or out of place?
Did the traffic flow work?

Not only did the study save the center money, it enabled staff to correct problems and resulted in a successful tour of the exhibit.

Formative evaluation allows you to make practical improvements relative to your project's learning goals, and can be implemented at any point in the life of your project.

Examples of ILI formative evaluations include:

Watershed Moments - National Aquarium, Baltimore, MD. The National Aquarium in Baltimore developed, implemented, and evaluated a staff-led, interactive auditorium program. This a new model for auditorium programming that integrates visitors' varied experiences over time—in life and at the Aquarium—in new and measurable ways. In order to develop this presentation, ILI was asked to conduct formative evaluation to test various concepts with the results informing the overall concept and development process.

Heart Smart - University of Miami and Miami Museum of Science, Miami, FL. This collaboration between a science center and a museum will create an exhibition on heart health the collects data from visitors as they go through the exhibition. This data can then be used by university scientists researching heart health in the Miami-area. The formative evaluation of the collaboration and the exhibit components will inform the process as well as the final exhibition. Funded by the National Institutes of Health.

Money Bus - Networks Financial Institute, Indianapolis, IN. For this innovative mobile financial literacy project, ILI conducted site visits, observations and interviews which provided key feedback for developing seamless interactive experiences.

Mummies, Manuscripts & Myths - Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, MD. The Walters Art Museum, in collaboration with SuperKids Camp at the Parks & People Foundation and Reading Is Fundamental, and with funding from Deutsche Bank and Deutsche Bank Alex Brown, developed a three-year, arts-based literacy program for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade students in four mid-city Baltimore schools. A formative evaluation was conducted to provide museum staff with a measure for the effectiveness of program structure and its implementation.

Family Exploring Science Together - New Jersey State Aquarium, Camden, NJ, The Academy of Natural Sciences, The Franklin Institute Science Museum, The Philadelphia Zoo, Philadelphia, PA. As a continuation of the ground-breaking PIESC project, museum institutions and community-based organizations collaborated to provide a hands-on science experiences for families. A variety of formats, including open-houses and workshops, were used to introduce families to science resources in their communities. Funding provided by the National Science Foundation.

Life Changes - New York Hall of Science, New York, NY; North Museum of Natural History & Science, Lancaster, PA. This NSF-funded project investigates how children think about biological change and evolution with the formative evaluation focused on whether educational principles derived from developmental and cognitive research are capable of affecting conceptual change in children (changing intuitive to scientific reasoning), and whether museum exhibit prototypes effectively capture those educational principles.