How is your organisation adjusting to the new world of isolation?
Managing collections ‘behind closed doors’ presents new challenges for engaging your communities. Are you looking for ways to innovate, keep collections visible and share local histories over the next few months? Now is a great time to bump up your social media and/or website activity, share short videos of highlights from your collections, set up a Facebook page or reinvigorate one that has been on the back-burner.
We thought we’d share a quick round up of ideas and initiatives to inspire you. We’d love to see your contributions too!
Training opportunities
If you can’t get into your organisation to continue your usual work, there are some great opportunities for upskilling online.
- Marketing skills with the SA Tourism Commission
- Focus on digitisation of collections with AMaGA, the peak body for Museums and Galleries in Australia
- Discover new online skills using the myriad resources on the website Be Connected.
- Free online courses at Adelaide X by the University of Adelaide.
South Australians stay home
There are some great initiatives already online that you can enjoy at home.
- Take a short tour through the Army Museum of South Australia.
- View a range of videos from the SA Aviation Museum showing engine runs, community events and activities.
- Explore the collections at the Gawler Old Telegraph Station Museum.
Keep connected with people around South Australia through Social Media
- The Peterborough History Group chose an historic image from their collection as a way to assure their Facebook followers of their intention to stay connected.
- City of Port Adelaide Enfield Libraries are sharing #WindBackWednesday on Facebook. A great way to share historic images.
- You can check out local and worldwide museums in the thread #MuseumAtHome on Twitter.
- The South Australian Maritime Museum are sharing their ideas for Family Fun Day on Mondays through Instagram.
Hahndorf Walking Tours have come up with a neat idea – sensory boxes home delivered with historical storytelling over Skype. Check out the short promo video here.
Contemporary collecting
The FAHS (Federation of Australian Historical Societies) is promoting history organisations contributing to collecting materials relating to the current pandemic. They suggest collecting hard copy items, and/or form a digital archive for future reference and research. FAHS also recommend groups add digital material to A Journal of the Plague Year: an Archive of COVID-19, which is a collaboration between universities worldwide, including the University of Melbourne.
Still missing your local museums?
You can see thousands of images from museums and collections throughout our state and the people who work with them on the South Australian History Network Flickr page. https://www.flickr.com/photos/communityhistorysa/albums
Of course we’d also love you to stay in touch with us at the History Trust of South Australia.
Let us know what we’ve missed!