Beyond the Classroom: Real and Virtual Field Trips

The bits I most remember about my school days are those that took place outside the classroom, as we were taken on countless theater visits and trips to places of interest.  –Alan Bennett

School field trips are age-old traditions.  We know that children enjoy hands-on learning experiences that field trips provide. A trip can be as simple as an excursion to the neighborhood hardware store with a class of first graders or it might be an all day trip to a downtown museum.   Off campus visits give children an opportunity to connect classroom instruction with real life application.  

For students to get the most out of the experience, it’s important that the focus of the trip be relevant to what the students are studying in school.  Ask yourself, how does this trip relate to and support the curriculum? Does it provide an educational experience or is it just a chance to spend a day away from school?  When you can clearly pinpoint the educational objectives, you're ready to book the trip and start the planning process.  To help in planning, museum websites provide curriculum resources that align with the Common Core Standards.  A wide range of lesson plans are available that you can adapt to meet the needs of your students.  Other resources such as learning guides for use during the trip are also available.  Many art museums have published lesson plans that integrate art with science and math.  Here are links to excellent teacher resources from several U. S. art museums: The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, The Art Institute of Chicago, and the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles. 

After you've selected the field trip venue, introduce the field trip topic to your class.  Research shows that students learn more from a field trip when given pre-trip instruction.  Sharing photos, video, brochures and art items before the trip rouses their interest.  You can even have students research the field trip site and create their own essential questions.  Prior to the trip, help students refine their observation skills.  Practice looking at ordinary objects such as a paper clip, a paintbrush, a comb, clothespins, etc.  Ask them what they see and what they notice about the object that they never saw before?  These exercises develop new ways of seeing that students can use during the trip.

Explore the museum’s website as a class to identify the kinds of exhibits on display.  Introduce materials they'll use at the museum along with trip specific vocabulary.  To see some examples of outstanding materials, look at these field trip guides available from Chicago's Lincoln Park Zoo.  These are valuable resources not only for a zoo field trip, but also for a general study guide of animal behavior. 

Just as pre-planning provides a richer field trip experience,  follow-up activities reinforce learning.  These activities allow another opportunity to process  and reinforce concepts.  Discuss  student's  general impressions of the trip and review assignments related to the event.  Create a bulletin board showing materials created and collected as part of the field trip.  Write and send thank you notes to chaperones and other people who supported the trip.  And consider creating a slide show to play at a  school event.

While a trip to a museum is ideal, sometimes funding or geographic distance are an issue.  Then a virtual field trip is the next best thing.  There are an amazing number of such trips available on the internet.  Introduce virtual trips in the same manner as you would a trip to a local venue.    By doing both real and virtual trips, students will benefit from a wide variety of experiences. 

The peak season for field trips are May and June.  In the future, consider taking trips earlier in the year when museums are less crowded and students can have a more leisurely visit.  Trips taken at the start of the year help students develop teamwork skills that can be used during the entire school year.

Create a garden; bring children to farms for field trips. I think it's important that parents and teachers get together to do one or two things they can accomplish well - a teaching garden, connecting with farms nearby, weave food into the curriculum.       -Alice Waters

How Do We Get Students Excited about Learning?

The dream begins with a teacher who believes in you, who tugs and pushes and leads you to the next plateau, sometimes poking you with a sharp stick called 'truth'.  -Dan Rather

This blog post has been challenging to write.   I’ve had a daunting time determining the article’s actual topic.  I intended to write an article on respectful teacher/student relationships; however, the more information I read, the more confused I became.  I questioned if I was writing an article about the importance of teachers building respectful relationships with students or was I writing an article about motivating students? Articles on relationship building yielded information on student motivation.  Articles on student motivation yielded information on the power of respectful relationships.  After mulling the topics over for a few days, I can confidently say that respectful teacher-student relationships generate academic motivation, one is critical to the other and neither exists in isolation!

Since observing in classrooms has been my professional focus for a number of year, I'm interested in the many aspects of effective classroom surroundings.  When I visit any classroom the one question that’s always in the back of my mind is how does it feel emotionally to be a member of the classroom community? Needless to say, students are more productive when they live and work in an environment where they feel they are important, valued, and genuinely cared-for.  Does a particular classroom offer an environment where supportive feedback is provided on an ongoing basis, where the teacher has high expectations for herself and her students, and the students are able to grow as whole persons-physically, emotionally, socially, and cognitively? In a relationship-rich classrooms, the teacher finds creative and enjoyable ways to keep students engaged, and she never gives up on any student.

Here are some fascinating video examples of primary, middle school, and high school teachers who model relationship-rich classroom settings.  These highlighted teachers provide warm, caring climates that foster the best in social and academic learning. Sit back and enjoy the videos.

Melissa Porferio, 1^st Grade Teacher

In Melissa Porferio's first grade classroom,  she concentrates on building empathetic relationships and developing the whole child.

Dorina Sackman, Middle School Teacher

Dorina Sackman has high expectations of her ESL middle school students.  By giving constructive feedback on an ongoing basis, she helps her student build their skills incrementally.

Sean McComb, High School Teacher

High school teacher Sean McComb encourages students to do their best and celebrates their hard work and effort.  By knowing his student's stories he is able to help them become confident  in their own emerging skills.

In the video Are We Failing Our Students? Dr. Pedro Noguera, professor of education at NYU’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Development asks, “ Why is it that educating children in America has become so hard?”  He believes the educational community has been asking the wrong questions.  Rather than looking at raising achievement, he thinks we should be looking at relationship issues.  He suggests that a better question might be, “How do we get kids excited about learning?"  When we ask different questions, we get different answers! When we get different answers, we might be moving in a more productive direction.  How will you build respectful relationships in your classroom?


None of us got where we are solely by pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps. We got here because somebody - a parent, a teacher, an Ivy League crony or a few nuns - bent down and helped us pick up our boots. -Thurgood Marshall