ABSTRACT
This chapter considers factors that might support children in developing the personal connections and the ways in which they might be expressed. In the Review of the Value of Museums and Galleries, C. Scott et al. argue that in these changing times the user will play a more active role than before. The chapter explores the role that foregrounding the interactions between young children and objects. Of course, the social and cultural context in which the children encounter these objects is important in whether they are experienced as significant. The socio-cultural interpretation alone, however, does not sufficiently explain those moments when children spontaneously make connections with museum objects or features that do not command the attention of other visitors, but which seem meaningful for children. Physical bodies and physical objects are also sites of emotional interactions, so this is another consideration when trying to understand what is happening when young children and museum objects come together.
