Project Days for Schools

Since 2016, lab.Bode – Initiative to Strengthen Museum Education has been exploring innovative formats for education and outreach at the Bode-Museum. The project days developed by lab.Bode are based on interdisciplinary questions and interests of pupils and teachers, which have been tried out in the intensive cooperation with nine Berlin partner schools.

Designed as free offers, the project days give school groups of all ages the opportunity to get to know the Bode-Museum from new perspectives. Whether through dance and performance at “Museum Moves. Sculpture, Museum and Movement”, using mathematical thought systems in “Museology – What does math in the museum?” or from various perspectives on gender, body and sexual lifestyles in “Let’s talk about Sex!” The project days are each designed as extensions of the school curriculum and are available to all schools free of charge as bookable offers.

All offerings must be booked at least three weeks in advance. Entry is free for groups of up to 30 people in conjunction with the programme. One accompanying person for every 10 school children also receives free entry.

To register your school class, please call 030/266 42 4242 (Mon–Fri, 9 am–4 pm), send an email (service@smb.museum), or use the respective registration form.

Project Days for School Children and Youth

I. Is it all real? Getting to Know the Bode-Museum

Grades 1 through 7 / 180 Minutes / free, registration required

What is there to see here? Is it all real? And what does this have to do with me? Guided by these questions, school children and youth explore the Bode-Museum in small teams. They investigate exhibition objects, the museum’s architecture, costly materials, and fascinating stories, asking whether these things have any connection to their own lives. Using pens and paper, cameras, and their bodies, they collect their impressions, which are then expanded upon with a few personal reflections and compiled into a small exhibition.

Please find the registration form (in German) here!

II. Museum Moves. Sculpture, Museum, and Motion

Grades 7 through 10 / 240 Minutes / free, registration required

In Museum Moves school groups use the sculpture collection to think about poses, body language, and movement, not just looking at works of art but also museum visitors. How do they move through the museum? What do these movements say about art and about the space and institution of the museum? Using methods from dance and performance, participants explore not only art and the museum but also make connections to their own experience.

Please find the registration form (in German) here!

III. Let’s talk about Sex! Gender and Forms of Sexual Diversity in Art

Grades 7 through 10 / 240 Minutes / free, registration required

Why are they all naked? Is that porn? In Let’s talk about Sex! participants discover a diverse range of representations of gender, bodies, and different kinds of sexuality in the Sculpture Collection of the Bode-Museum. Using the works of art as a basis, participants engage in a dialogue, in which current issues relating to gender, LGBTIQA*, body image, consent, and pornography are identified and negotiated. The workshop has been developed as a supplement to sexual education.

*LGBTIQA stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual, intersexual, queer, and asexual

Please find the registration form (in German) here!

IV. Museologic – What are maths doing in a museum?

Grades 7 through 10 / 240 Minutes / free, registration required

What does an art museum have to do with math? Both in math and in a museum objects are compared with one another and assessed in terms of relationships and categories. Categories determine our thinking and perception. They form the basis for counting, selecting, organizing, and presenting. As active researchers, participants from schools examine the exhibition in relation to categories, reflect on the concept of numbers, and use photographs that they take themselves to create an exhibition model based on their own categorical structures. The offering is conceived to supplement curricula in maths, philosophy, and art. It inspires participants to enjoy thinking processes — in math and in the museum.

Please find the registration form (in German) here!