Through the example of a fourth-semester course on modern German history, this article explores the application of interactive and experiential learning models inspired by museum pedagogy. In response to the ACTFL Standards and the 2007 MLA report, the teaching of culture has become a priority and educators continue to seek innovative ways to teach culture and to attain the goals of "comparisons" and "connections," as well as translingual and transcultural competence. This article demonstrates that museum strategies can be productively transferred to content-based foreign language instruction to provide learning experiences in which students interact critically with the objects of cultural archives. Both actual and virtual museum visits, as well as the integration of primary materials in the classroom, can further students' transcultural competence and critical thinking about the interrelations of culture and language, as well as provide intellectually and aesthetically engaging learning experiences. § In a discussion of her book The Multilingual Subject, Claire Kramsch emphasizes that more attention should be paid to the "aesthetic dimension of learning," and to the fact that learners acquire language "with all their senses" (2012, p. 76). This has long been recognized in the field of museum pedagogy, which emphasizes the experiential and multi-dimensional nature of learning, engaging the senses and intellect in study of the museum's objects. Museum educators often cite John Dewey's Art as Experience as foundational for theorizing the affective component of learning and the kind of experience the museum can facilitate. In this article, I show how aspects of museum teaching can be productively applied to content-based foreign language (FL) instruction. Through the example of a fourth-semester course on modern German history, taught in German, and including museum visits, this article provides concrete examples of how interactive and experiential learning models can help instructors design, teach, and assess content-based courses. This approach can help instructors incorporate museums into their courses, as well as interdisciplinary work with primary sources and a focus on the affective dimension of learning.In what follows, I first briefly summarize the literature on content-based instruction (CBI) and situate it within the context of the ongoing discussion of the 2007 MLA report on "New Structures for a Changed World," and also within the context of the ACTFL Standards "5 Cs" (National Standards, 2006). I go on to highlight key aspects of museum pedagogy and show how strategies inspired by the museum can be productively integrated into content-based language courses, and how doing so can help us work towards the MLA and ACTFL goals. I not only suggest ways of bringing the class into the museum, literally or virtually, but also ways of bringing the museum into the classroom, engaging students with a range of different sources 251
