Thinking Through Art: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum School Partnership Program year 3 research results

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and an outside evaluation company, ILI, conducted research on the Gardner’s School Partnership Program (SPP), a multiple-visit museum education program for elementary school students. The study examines how participation in the program affected the development of students’ critical thinking skills. It was carried out over three individual phases, each building on and informed by the previous year’s research findings. This research summary focuses on year three of the evaluation. In this year, the researchers wanted to assess the effects of participation in a multiple-visit art museum program on students’ critical thinking skills in both a school setting, a museum setting and in terms of comprehensive academic standardized tests scores in both English language arts and mathematics. The researchers found treatment group students (those participating in the program) showed more evidence of critical thinking skills in both the school and museum setting than the control group of students who did not participate in the program. Standardized test score results were not available at the time of this report.