INTRODUCING PORTABLE DIGITAL DEVICES INTO SCIENCE MUSEUM OUTREACH ACTIVITIES: HOW DIVERSE CAN IT BE?

Centro Ciência Viva do Algarve (CCVAlg) is an Interactive Science Museum located in southern Portugal, which mission is to promote scientific and technological culture among the population and especially the youth community. Besides the interactive modules in the permanent exhibition, we design and deploy a wide range of science activities inside and outside our facilities. However, as we are nowadays facing a society (and a science environment) more and more “digital”, the use of technological tools and channels to carry out this mission cannot be ignored, otherwise it will give a biased and obsolete view of today´s reality regarding the techniques and methodologies that the XXI century scientific community uses. On this basis, CCVAlg´s strategy for the last couple of years has been to try to overcome such technological gap introducing and developing new methodologies for our activities. Having this in mind, we approached a Portuguese hardware manufacturer and achieved to forge a partnership that granted 10 detachable tablets with several specific sensors and add-ons that

allowed us to design new and innovative outreach activities. The integration of the received devices into the Center´s educational offer allowed us to diversify the pedagogical offer and involve cerca 3300 participants in the new activities. This type of collaboration reinforce the fact that Science museums should play a key role as strategic partners in the implementation of Information and Communication Technologies (ITC) pilot projects.