4,Kodomo Hikari Project ~ Museum Collaboration for Children in the Tohoku Region

 

Mao MATSUDA

Kids Plaza Osaka

 

The Kodomo Hikari Project is a network which various museums and individuals join from all over Japan and provides interesting experience and learning opportunity for children and families who suffered from the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in 2011. In Japanese, kodomo means “Children” and Hikari means “Light”. We named this project as a wish that each small activity (=light) would bring people together and evolve into a large project to shine light on children in the Tohoku region.
Since March 2012, we have undertaken many projects mainly in the Tohoku region. At the Kodomo Hikari Festival in June 2013 we offered 19 workshops with 136 staff members from various institutions including aquariums, science museums, planetariums, art museums, children’s museums and much more. This interdisciplinary approach has served as an opportunity to cultivate project member’s creativity and motivation as well. The project includes a mobile exhibition which visits local community centers with the museum’s collection and holds conferences for sharing each project and building future plans.
We also believe in the importance of collaborative work with people who live in the community and the project’s durability. From the beginning we have worked with university students in the Tohoku region. We hope they become essential talents who lead the community’s development and support children’s smiles through the Kodomo Hikari Project.