The Exploratorium has three highly regarded professional development programs: the Teacher Institute, which supports secondary science and math teachers; the Institute for Inquiry, which offers workshops about the theory and practice of inquiry-based teaching and learning; and the Exploratorium Network for Exhibit-Based Teaching, which shares Exploratorium exhibits and teaching practices with other science institutions.
Like our exhibits, our education programs are infused with the ideas of Exploratorium founder Frank Oppenheimer. Before opening the museum, Frank had been a successful high school teacher and college professor, always teaching with what he called props—tools and devices that let students interact with phenomena. “Explaining science and technology without props,“ Frank said, “can resemble an attempt to tell what it’s like to swim without ever letting a person near the water.”
Whether on the exhibit floor or in the classroom, the Exploratorium believes that learners should be able to directly observe and manipulate natural phenomena. Active engagement with natural phenomena encourages learners to ask and investigate their own questions—inquiry learning—and to test, modify, or expand their ideas about how the world works.
