Introduction
Museums in Miniature: Bringing Entomology to Public K-12 Education
What are MiMS?
The MiMs project was started by staff and students at Clemson University in South Carolina, and now Dr. Pat Wooden has brought the project to the Mississippi Entomological Museum in Mississippi. MIMs are mini-museums. Each mini-museum is a glass topped insect drawer with 100 pinned specimens including the state insects and other commonly encountered insects. Drawers are loosely organized by order and contain families from the five major insect orders (Coleoptera, Diptera, Hemiptera, Hymenoptera,and Lepidoptera) and assorted other superorders. People learn from examples, so only specimens that have been properly pinned, pointed, and labeled are included. This way, students can see what a real museum looks like, albeit on a smaller scale. Families of insects, or even particular species, are selected to facilitate lessons in ecosystem services, integrated pest management, and conservation. For example, every drawer includes pollinators (e.g., bees and moths), agricultural and urban pests (e.g., Japanese beetles and smoky brown cockroaches), and invasive species (e.g., the kudzu bug).
In addition to the Museums in Miniature, museum staff and students have created lesson plans and fact sheets that teachers can use for classroom instruction. Current fact sheets are available on this web site, just click the "Fact Sheets" tab on the left menu bar to access available fact sheets. For anyone interesting in creating a fact sheet, a template is available on the "Fact Sheet" page.
Bring MiMs to Your Educational Organization:
For educators interested in bringing a MiMs to your school, library, or museum programming or in bringing MiMs to your state or sponsoring a drawer in Mississippi, please contact Mississippi Project Manager: Dr. Pat Wooden PLW161@msstate.edu. Educators who are interested in this program in South Carolina should contact the South Carolina Project Manager: Dr. Mike Ferro spongymesophyll@gmail.com (Clemson University).
Current and Past Funding:
Entomological Society of America Chrysalis Fund
South Carolina Entomological Society
Publicity
Link to an article about the project in South Carolina: https://news.clemson.edu/miniature-museums-show-how-bugs-are-cool/
DOI for publication about the project: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/ae/tmae026
