I look forward to field trip days, which typically come about once a month. Frankly, I enjoy being able to skip the usual set-up that goes into preparing for a normal school day, often taking the opportunity to sleep in a little. And I know I'm going to need to be as alert as possible. Being out in the world with 20+ preschoolers is a huge responsibility, even if they are already experts at keeping their adults in sight and avoiding the most significant danger we'll face: traffic. There's also the constant concern that someone will be left behind, despite our yellow field trip t-shirt, our constant counting, and our many chaperones. I'm always drained at the end of a field trip day, as are the kids. As are the parents, even those who didn't chaperone.
It's stressful, but worth it. The things we learn or experience are wonderful, of course, things like rowing a boat together at the Center for Wooden Boats or discovering coyote scat in the Magnuson Park wetlands, but the real value is in the adventure, which is, after all, the story of Maurice Sendak's
Where The Wild Things Are. Often we go places to which the children have already been with their families, but when we go there together, getting there under our own power, sharing an experience, it becomes something we "own" as a community, becoming a common resource for our every day routines, expectations, rules, art projects, sensory table play, building, dramatic games, and songs.
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