What can happen when you take students to a museum to learn?

“A facility that fosters creativity . . . is a place that allows people to discover, develop, and exploit their own natural intelligences. It’s a place where there are no stupid questions, and it is not a place where there is only one right answer. It’s a place that values irreverence, the lively, the dynamic, the surprising, the playful. And it is a place that values, above all, curiosity and the ability to make connections, to make those cognitive leaps.” —Peter Richards

Richards seems to be describing museums at their best, as places where visitors feel encouraged to engage in minds-on and hands-on learning and exercise their creativity. Creativity is certainly a hot topic in the museum world these days, and many professional publications, including a recent issue of the Informal Learning Review, have been addressing its place in our field. What is the role of museums, and specifically museum educators, in nurturing creativity? What are some successful museum program techniques and formats for fostering it among our visitors?