According to statistics from the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Vietnam currently has a total of 162 public and private museums, which are home to more than three million artefacts, reflecting the entire development process of Vietnamese history, culture, and people.
Students taking notes on artefacts on display at the Vietnam National Museum of History. (Photo: Thanh Dat)
However, these museums have just served as a place to keep historical and cultural objects rather than becoming a learning space which can help to increase people’s understanding of history and culture, especially among students and youngsters.
Given the situation, in late 2021 the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism issued a document on promoting digital transformation and fostering coordination between the education and museum sectors.
Under the document, the ministry has asked museums to enhance human resource capacity in the age of digital transformation, and step up the building of a digital database. Museums are also asked to coordinate with local departments of education and training to organise appropriate programmes for educating students on national history, thus inspiring their national patriotism.
The cooperation between museums and schools will benefit both sides. It not only assists museums to promote the values of objects but also contributes to educating future generations about the love and pride of the country’s cultural heritage while helping schools to achieve their educational goals of providing knowledge to students and inspiring their patriotism.
In recent years, many schools in such localities as Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Quang Ninh province, and Da Nang city, have made remarkable efforts in bringing cultural heritage into their teaching programmes.
A group of students listening to a tour guide at Nha Rong Port Museum in Ho Chi Minh City (Photo: tuoitre. vn)
Accordingly, during lessons on cultural heritage, students can visit museums, listen to cultural experts talk about history, and experience cultural spaces through virtual reality technology. These lessons have raised the children’s sense of preserving the cultural heritage of their locality and the country in general.
For their part, museums need to play a more active role in bringing cultural heritage to students and build specific programmes for each student age group in line with what they learn at school.
Building a cultural environment at the grassroots level is one of the top issues which were placed for discussion at the National Cultural Conference held in November 2021. Participants at the conference agreed that promoting the education of museum heritage through the application of digital achievements is an urgent task for the museum system in all countries, including Vietnam.
Building a digital database of heritage will help to advertise the cultural and historical values of the museums to the public, especially young people. With the support and coordination of museums, the education of cultural heritage in schools will contribute to creating a premise for Vietnamese future generations to actively integrate with the world, while still respecting their national heritage.