Museum Box
By Polly Conway,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Curate collections, history with nifty archive tool.
A Lot or a Little?
What you will—and won't—find in this website.
Community Reviews
There aren't any parent reviews yet. Be the first to review this title.
What’s It About?
Kids will begin creating a museum box by choosing a topic (family, the Civil War, 1950s toy robots, etc.), then gathering multimedia that can be virtually kept in the box. The website supports text, photos, audio, and video. Once you open the interface, you can make some decisions about your box. Each box contains a number of cubes (you can choose how many), and each side of a cube can hold a piece of media, which is uploaded, placed in \"My Drawer,\" then dragged-and-dropped into the appropriate spot. Organization and a bit of strategy comes into play here, but the layers of information that a box can hold are nearly infinite.
Is It Any Good?
MUSEUM BOX is really well-designed, and kids who like categorizing and cataloguing things will love to play around with it. There are so many options; for example, you could create a simple, single-cube box called "Chicken," featuring changes in the bird's development on each side, or a three-layered box with 24 cubes encompassing highlights of 1800s British Literature by region. The drag-and-drop interface is easy to use, and while it sometimes takes the finished boxes a little time to load, the end result is pretty cool.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Ask your kids: If you could make a real museum box containing the things most important to you, what would it hold? This could include sounds, special memories, objects, etc.
Visit a local museum and pay special attention to how things are displayed. Are there signs next to paintings with historical information? Why are some items under glass, but others are not?
Explore some of the museum boxes that have been created and shared by other people online. What new things did you learn?
Website Details
- Subjects: Social Studies: cultural understanding, events, history, Hobbies: collecting, Language & Reading: forming arguments, storytelling, using supporting evidence
- Skills: Tech Skills: digital creation, using and applying technology, Thinking & Reasoning: applying information, collecting data, strategy, Creativity: combining knowledge, imagination, producing new content, Communication: conveying messages effectively, multiple forms of expression, Responsibility & Ethics: honoring the community, Emotional Development: perspective taking
- Genre: Educational
- Topics: History
- Pricing structure: Free, Paid
- Last updated: November 5, 2015
Did we miss something on diversity?
Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.
Suggest an Update
Our Editors Recommend
Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.
See how we rate