ABSTRACT
Museum education services were especially developed during the war, in response to the needs of civilians and services personnel. Exhibitions were created and organised so as to serve those needs and were an important means of civic and community engagement for museums. Molly Harrison saw an opportunity to develop the Geffrye Museum as a creative environment offering mixture of social welfare and education to deprived communities in Shoreditch. The national Holidays at Home scheme, launched by the government provide entertainment for communities within their local area, offered opportunity for museums. Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts (CEMA) sponsored local arts events, and museums became the focus for wide range of activities during the summer with children's games, competitions, concerts, dancing, special exhibitions, tours and outings, art activities and film showings. In an application of debates on education and citizenship that had occupied museum educationalists in the 1930s, visual methods were used to promote the responsibilities of citizenship.
