It's 11am on day one of the school holidays and - eek - I've run out of things for my kids to do. A quick internet search reveals a host of exciting possibilities: there's the art trolley at the Tate, for starters, or a mask-making workshop at the Horniman, or we could go to the Museum of London to a special session on Londinium-dwellers' taste in footwear.
It all sounds enticing (and, of course, since we live in the capital, the examples above are the tip of the iceberg - every museum has heaps on offer). But when I call to ask what age groups the events are suitable for, a disappointing uniformity emerges: almost everything is aimed at kids in the primary school bracket. Perfect for my younger children, aged seven and four; but not quite pitched at my older girls, who are 12 and 14.
So what's happened? Have museums forgotten that between small kids (who are well catered for) and proper grown-ups (also well catered for) there is another group of people, those big kids we call teenagers? With this year's Gulbenkian Prize for museums and galleries came my chance to find out.
I was invited to be one of the seven judges, which meant four months spent touring some of the brightest and best museums in Britain. Along the way, I thought, I'd do a bit of research into whether museums really were neglecting adolescents - and why this should be.
It didn't take long to confirm my suspicions: almost every museum we visited had a programme for teenagers, but it was usually a term-time activity linked with the national curriculum or a project aimed specifically at disadvantaged youngsters.
Both are laudable: doubtless museums should support school learning, and it's obviously a great idea to reach out to young people who aren't using museums as much as they could be.
But what about the thousands of youngsters aged between 12 and 18 who have, like my own children, had a childhood peppered with visits to imaginative, entertaining museums? What about all these kids whose parents have, like me, been enticed into museums by their wonderful programmes of exciting things to do at weekends and in the school holidays, for whom the events offered by museums and galleries have been the very backbone of many a weekend, half-term or longer break?
Why should the opportunity for special events, such as the chance to do some artwork or to explore some aspect of history or to examine some area of nature or geography or culture, not be there for them when they're 12-plus, just as it was for them in their younger years?
Some of the professionals I talked to on my Gulbenkian travels said that museums try to cater for everyone, so that adolescents were as
welcomed as any other group, and that they should, as they are older, be able to access the museum materials better than the younger age group.
Which sounds reasonable enough: but many of the people I spoke to said, in their very next breath, how difficult a visitor group teenagers are, and how they despair of being able to lure them through their doors.
Now you don't need to tell the mother of a teenager how difficult teenagers can be, so this wasn't surprising. But what did surprise me was that more museums weren't trying to meet the challenge. Because yes, teenagers can be tricky customers. But they're certainly not impossible; and there are real reasons why curators should try harder to get it right.
Here's why. Firstly, because these children have grown up expecting museums to be the sort of places that offer them an interesting refuge in the long, boring weeks of the school holidays (yes, even kids admit holidays are boring sometimes).
They've got used to having a trip to the Tate or the Horniman; they've got used to there being something special and interesting to do when they get there, something more interesting than just looking at things - a talk, maybe, or the chance to do some artwork or handle the exhibits. Then suddenly the museum or gallery where they have spent many happy holidays doesn't want them in its workshops any more. They are understandably disappointed.
Secondly, there's the future to think of. If you've wooed a group of children into your museum, made them feel welcome and provided lots of diversions for them, it's not sensible to leave them high and dry once they're 13. Kids in this age group are, as the curators often told me, more difficult as a client group: which means that museums should be trying all the harder to provide fascinating activities for them.
How about special teen sleepovers? (Single-sex, please!) How about longer art workshops - day-long, perhaps - that allow young people to work on a quite serious piece that they can put some thought and time into?
How about getting some funky, edgy and thought-provoking speakers who know teen language and who pitch their opinions at where today's teens are? (A session on communication through the ages, for example, could be right up-to-date with texting and MSN-ing and how these teen pursuits are changing the way we communicate today, a kind of history in the making that every 12- to 18-year-old will identify with.)
Thirdly (and most importantly), provide the right edutainment for teenagers and - believe me - they'll love it. My 14-year-old is totally underwhelmed by the idea of spending her holidays traipsing around with me and her younger siblings. She'd jump at the chance to spend a whole day, on her own or with a mate, at a museum where she could do something interesting, get away from her family and have some autonomy.
One of the few places that does put on occasional workshops for teenagers is London's Somerset House. My daughter had a fabulous day there in her last holidays doing screen printing (a messy task you wouldn't want to do at home).
She loved the grown-upness of getting there on the Tube on her own, and wandering out onto The Strand to get her lunch (I signed a form to say I was happy for her to be unsupervised over lunchtime).
I know she'd jump at the chance to do something similar again. The only problem is, there's nothing much to suggest.
Joanna Moorhead is a journalist and author
It all sounds enticing (and, of course, since we live in the capital, the examples above are the tip of the iceberg - every museum has heaps on offer). But when I call to ask what age groups the events are suitable for, a disappointing uniformity emerges: almost everything is aimed at kids in the primary school bracket. Perfect for my younger children, aged seven and four; but not quite pitched at my older girls, who are 12 and 14.
So what's happened? Have museums forgotten that between small kids (who are well catered for) and proper grown-ups (also well catered for) there is another group of people, those big kids we call teenagers? With this year's Gulbenkian Prize for museums and galleries came my chance to find out.
I was invited to be one of the seven judges, which meant four months spent touring some of the brightest and best museums in Britain. Along the way, I thought, I'd do a bit of research into whether museums really were neglecting adolescents - and why this should be.
It didn't take long to confirm my suspicions: almost every museum we visited had a programme for teenagers, but it was usually a term-time activity linked with the national curriculum or a project aimed specifically at disadvantaged youngsters.
Both are laudable: doubtless museums should support school learning, and it's obviously a great idea to reach out to young people who aren't using museums as much as they could be.
But what about the thousands of youngsters aged between 12 and 18 who have, like my own children, had a childhood peppered with visits to imaginative, entertaining museums? What about all these kids whose parents have, like me, been enticed into museums by their wonderful programmes of exciting things to do at weekends and in the school holidays, for whom the events offered by museums and galleries have been the very backbone of many a weekend, half-term or longer break?
Why should the opportunity for special events, such as the chance to do some artwork or to explore some aspect of history or to examine some area of nature or geography or culture, not be there for them when they're 12-plus, just as it was for them in their younger years?
Some of the professionals I talked to on my Gulbenkian travels said that museums try to cater for everyone, so that adolescents were as
welcomed as any other group, and that they should, as they are older, be able to access the museum materials better than the younger age group.
Which sounds reasonable enough: but many of the people I spoke to said, in their very next breath, how difficult a visitor group teenagers are, and how they despair of being able to lure them through their doors.
Now you don't need to tell the mother of a teenager how difficult teenagers can be, so this wasn't surprising. But what did surprise me was that more museums weren't trying to meet the challenge. Because yes, teenagers can be tricky customers. But they're certainly not impossible; and there are real reasons why curators should try harder to get it right.
Here's why. Firstly, because these children have grown up expecting museums to be the sort of places that offer them an interesting refuge in the long, boring weeks of the school holidays (yes, even kids admit holidays are boring sometimes).
They've got used to having a trip to the Tate or the Horniman; they've got used to there being something special and interesting to do when they get there, something more interesting than just looking at things - a talk, maybe, or the chance to do some artwork or handle the exhibits. Then suddenly the museum or gallery where they have spent many happy holidays doesn't want them in its workshops any more. They are understandably disappointed.
Secondly, there's the future to think of. If you've wooed a group of children into your museum, made them feel welcome and provided lots of diversions for them, it's not sensible to leave them high and dry once they're 13. Kids in this age group are, as the curators often told me, more difficult as a client group: which means that museums should be trying all the harder to provide fascinating activities for them.
How about special teen sleepovers? (Single-sex, please!) How about longer art workshops - day-long, perhaps - that allow young people to work on a quite serious piece that they can put some thought and time into?
How about getting some funky, edgy and thought-provoking speakers who know teen language and who pitch their opinions at where today's teens are? (A session on communication through the ages, for example, could be right up-to-date with texting and MSN-ing and how these teen pursuits are changing the way we communicate today, a kind of history in the making that every 12- to 18-year-old will identify with.)
Thirdly (and most importantly), provide the right edutainment for teenagers and - believe me - they'll love it. My 14-year-old is totally underwhelmed by the idea of spending her holidays traipsing around with me and her younger siblings. She'd jump at the chance to spend a whole day, on her own or with a mate, at a museum where she could do something interesting, get away from her family and have some autonomy.
One of the few places that does put on occasional workshops for teenagers is London's Somerset House. My daughter had a fabulous day there in her last holidays doing screen printing (a messy task you wouldn't want to do at home).
She loved the grown-upness of getting there on the Tube on her own, and wandering out onto The Strand to get her lunch (I signed a form to say I was happy for her to be unsupervised over lunchtime).
I know she'd jump at the chance to do something similar again. The only problem is, there's nothing much to suggest.
Joanna Moorhead is a journalist and author
