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Exhibition - Social Story

sarah7's picture

One thing I really loved from A Fierce Kind of Love was the "Know Before You Go" guides - especially the social narratives they provided for both the play and the venue. I also found the Smithsonian's social guides and they are so helpful as well: http://www.si.edu/Accessibility/NMAH-Social-Stories

I think it could be really great to create a social story for our exhibition. Obviously we are working with a limited time frame and the exhibition won't be installed until next weekend, so realisiticaly it may be most feasible to focus on a social story of arriving to the exhibition. Here are some things I am thinking we could include, each with an image and a 1-2 sentence text description:

- Entraces to Haverford College - both of the HC entrances can be difficult to locate due to the lack of sinage, so we could include a picture of what they look like

-Directions to parking (probably the South lot?) from each of the entrances - we could highlight the route on a campus map and specifically highlight the accessible parking spots, include a picture of what the lot actually looks like 

- Directions to the rotunda from the South lot - we could include a map, but since it is a pretty straight shot we could also potentially just include a photo of the direction you would travel from the South lot (and include a rough estimate of how far it is from the South lot to Zubrow, potentially indicating a spot that is closer to the exhibition where visitors could be dropped off - like the spot Stephanie parks when she drops CCW people off) 

-Singage - we could include an image of what the signs our visitors should follow will look like (maybe we should each also wear some kind of name tag that indicates we are available to help and answer questions?)  

-Directions from the Rotunda to Zubrow - include an image of the stairs and also the elevator, again indicating that there will be signs to follow

-Quiet zone - a photo of the space that will serve as our quiet zone 

 

I am sure there are many other things we could also include (especially depending on the other engagement/accessibility practices we decide on)! 

Comments

lindsey's picture

I've decided to just comment on Sarah's post because I'm also really interested in trying to develop a social story.  In addition to things that Sarah has already mentioned, I think that it would be useful (if possible) to show a picture of the actual exhibit to show the layout and sort of describe where different art is placed.  I like how in the A Fierce Kind of Love documents they gave an outline of the storyline, and maybe we can do something similar by including some type of written/ photo schedule of what exactly will happen during the exhibition opening.  If we do have objects that can be touched or felt, we can also include pictures of those (along with pictures of things that are meant for looking at) so that people know in advance what sorts of sensory experiences they may have while in the exhibit. 

nbarker's picture

I am 100% down for the idea of writing up a Social Story exhibition guide as an idea for this. You've listed out virtually the same things as part of the social story that I had considered, but I might suggest that we do a separate, shorter one for the exhibit opening party itself. That way, we could give people an idea what's going on. We could do it as all part of a larger accessibility guide, which would be several pages' worth likely (but not super-long) that we can attach to our announcements. Good thinking!