The audio guide adventure for our Paintings from the Collection exhibition was created by kids, for kids.

This project is part of the Library’s commitment to including the voices of children and young people in our exhibitions and learning programs. The project was led by Pauline Fitzgerald, Senior Education Officer, who has a particular interest in student voice. Ten students from Summer Hill Public School were invited to be part of the project and were supported by teacher librarians Carmel Grimmett and Lyndall Whiley from Summer Hill Public School.

The project began with the students visiting the Library, most for the first time and learning about the size of the collection had a big impact on the group. Their excitement continued to grow during a tour of the Paintings exhibition with Louise Anemaat, Executive Director, Library Services. The biggest challenge for each student was to select just one painting to research and write about.

The students had many different reasons for their selections:

• Georgia chose The Founding of Australia. By Capt Arthur Phillip RN Sydney Cove Jan 26th, 1788, painted in 1937, because she was familiar with it from her history lessons at school.
• Donald chose Ancestral Portrait of Quong Tart’s Mother, c 1988, because of his Chinese heritage and knowledge of the historical figure Quong Tart.
• Yevin chose A Family Group with Canoe, possibly near Clovelly, 1886, because she felt that the people in the painting were ‘speaking to her’.

After this introduction, Pauline visited the school over several weeks to work alongside the students to research their chosen painting and its maker. Posing questions such as: ‘If you stepped into this painting what would you smell, touch and hear?’ and ‘If you could speak to the subject of the painting what would you say to them?’ students were encouraged to look closely and think deeply about their chosen work and describe how it made them feel. Their depth of engagement and the thoughtfulness of their responses was outstanding.

Building on their research and conversations with the school’s teacher librarians, students then wrote and edited their script. At every stage, the adults involved in the project were impressed by the students’ commitment and the quality of their writing.

The final part of the process was to record the script, which we did in the school library’s book room — no need for a professional recording studio. The technical magic was provided by the Library’s multimedia producer and web team. In this way, an audio guide was born!

Feedback from teachers has encouraged us to adapt the content to produce this learning resource suitable for classroom use, hopefully inspiring more kid curators.