Step 2: Teaching with Field Trips

A Try, Teach, Tour Mindset

Field trips can be wonderful ways to teach kids in a fun, engaging environment.  Most of the time teachers "inherit" field trips from their predecessors which is extremely helpful since it frees you to focus on developing your teaching style.  However, in the last few years there have been many changes such as common core standards and next generation science standards.  Perhaps it's time for you to locate new exciting places to take your class.  If so, keep reading because this is the second step in my series about Teaching with Field Trips.   The four steps are:

1.  Brainstorm with a Partner-Plunge
2.  Research with a Try-Teach-Tour Mindset
3.  Evaluate Cost vs. Compensation
4.  Teach Kids to Explore & Explain

The second step is probably the most exciting part of the process.  You already took the plunge and created a list of possible field trips.  Now, you get to go out there and experience them.  As with the first step don't get hung up on the cost, we'll go into that in step 3.  Who you take with you depends upon how you want to experience the trip.  One trip was with my husband and our dog to a local beach.  Another was with a group of teacher friends, not necessarily from the same grade level or school site.  And yet another was with a friend and her son.  You could even go solo if that's what works best for you.  My only recommendation is to be with people who understand that you are looking at the educational value of that location. 

Use Guiding Questions:

 Guiding questions will help you determine if this particular location is a potential trip for your class.  In my opinion the most important questions are:  How does this fit into my curriculum? and Is this age-appropriate?  A field trip that is all fun and fluff is very entertaining but would the students learn something from their excursion?  If not, you might consider recommending families to go to the location for a fun outing rather than using precious resources on bus costs, etc.

One of the trips I explored was a location that I had been to multiple times in my life--Natural Bridges State Beach in Santa Cruz, CA.  The state beach that I visited was even the location I had been to as a child, a young adult, and a parent but...I had never been there in my teacher role which made it a totally different experience.  I started off by stopping at the ranger's station and gift store asking specific questions about field trips.  I had already completed a pre-trip research on their website but I was thinking of adding a beach clean-up.  I learned that the rangers are very accommodating in adding a service component to a class visit.  I also learned some interesting predator-prey information about the wildlife in the park.  After visiting the ranger, I went off to see EVERYTHING--the trails, the beach, the rock formations, the tide pools. 

I left that day full of inspiration on how this beach fits into curriculum and what I could teach either before or after the trip which I arranged into a lesson about mud stone, butterflies, and tide pools which you can find here...

On the flip side, a second trip to a national park was a beautiful day out with friends that did not spark my teacher interest.  I enjoyed the trip tremendously  it just wasn't a location that fit into my curriculum or standards as well as I thought when brainstorming.  In hindsight it's better that I researched prior to taking a class.  This location will become a recommendation of a place that parents can bring their children during vacations.  That's the value in using a Try-Teach-Tour mindset--you get to visit and experience locations to see if they fit into your classroom goals.  After going on several trips you can then put all your gathered information together to narrow down to a location by determining the value of taking a class.  That's what we'll explore in Step 3:  Teaching with Field Trips.

Step1: Teaching with Field Trips

Take the Partner-Plunge!

My previous post talked about the four steps to Teaching with Field Trips.  You can read the first post for some background on how I believe this creates authentic learning environments.  Briefly the four steps are:

1.  Brainstorm with a Partner-Plunge.

2.  Research with a Try-Teach-Tour Mindset.

3.  Evaluate Cost vs. Compensation.

4.  Teach Kids to Explore & Explain.

The first step is usually the hardest one to take.  Once you take the plunge it becomes easier to travel to the end of your destination.  What makes this so difficult?  Well, teachers have challenging, time consuming jobs often taking their work home with them in the evenings and on holidays.  Finding time to evaluate field trips can often become the path not followed.  Let's explore how we can take that plunge!

Where can you start to find a partner? Many schools have regularly scheduled Grade Level Meetings.  Sometimes administration will give you a topic to work on but there are often times that the teachers can work on a topic of their choice. This is a perfect time to ponder with your partners!  Start asking questions about the field trips.  Toss out cost (which is ALWAYS a big concern) and have a dream session.  Explore what's in your area that meets standards for your grade.  If you don't know then text, email, or call others during the meeting.  If you save this networking for later it will often not get done.  Be creative in who you contact.  Student's parents often know many different places that they have either taken their children during holidays.  Teachers who are parents may have ideas from their own child's school.  The key here is that it's not just one partner but many, such as grade level teams, other teachers, students parents, or friends, who can help you build a bucket list of travel ideas.

Another partner could be a local university that offers credits for teachers for exploring field trip locations.  We teachers are blessed with time off throughout the year that can be used for local excursions.  Additionally, teachers LOVE learning and many teachers choose to visit beaches, parks, and museums. This is definitely a motivator for a teacher to spend time on something they find worthy rather than projects their administrators find worthy.  Most independent study programs for credit often allow the educator to define the starting and ending date for your project.  Also, what teacher couldn't use a few extra credits?  In my area I use University of the Pacific but there are many other universities that you can choose.

So, once you have a brainstorm partners, created a bucket list, and possibly signed up for university credits, do you visit all these locations?  Again, don't think about cost outside what it will cost for you to personally travel.  These trips should be local and not use more than a partial day for travel and visit.  The reason that I keep repeating don't worry about the cost is that you could come up with lesson plan or project ideas.  So, there's more to be gained than simply taking your class to a cool location.  My recommendation would be that you critically review your list and choose 3-4 locations that you are most interested in visiting.

Here's an example:  At my school our principal dedicated one meeting day for all grade level teams to collaborate on field trip ideas.  Although we were all in the same room working in grade level teams.  Once in awhile you might hear one team call out to another across the room, "Hey, is your grade interested in..." or "Where was it that you heard about..."  Our initial list was quite large with ideas that ranged from beach clean-up to museums to obscure local museums that I didn't even know existed such as a Mining museum that will fit nicely with fourth grade earth science and social studies.  This exercise transported my mind into really questioning our current field trips (or lack of) and dedicate time through a university independent study course.   After following up on all my texts, emails, and reviewing my initial notes I had my 3-4 short list:

Trips I would explore:

1. Beach clean-up
2. Local Mining Museum
3. Local CA Mission
4. Museum

To recap, choose more than one partner to question your current field trip practice.  Keep your standards and age ability of students in mind.  Create a dream list of nearby local locations.  Consider taking a university independent study course to earn credits during your travels.  Review your brainstormed list and choose 3-4 places to visit.  Then visit!  We'll explore more on traveling in the next post in the series of "Teaching with Field Trips" with a Try-Teach-Tour Mindset.  Until then...

 Happy Partner-Pondering!

4 Steps to Teach with Field Trips!

There are many different sayings from many different eras of teaching...
Like a walk through the woods they travel from "Curriculum drives instruction" to "Data drives instruction" and everywhere in between.   Even today with Common Core and NGSS standards teachers still hear about, train for, and test for curriculum and data.  What if we took a different approach?  What if instead of using data and curriculum we used authentic learning?

To me, authentic learning takes place when students learn about themselves as they reflect upon how they fit in the world.  To do this we can let field trips along with standards drive our instruction.  If you take this approach you will increase engagement and buy-in with students while creating lifelong memories. And that path leads to the kind of retention of facts children need!

The next few posts will explore the idea of how to brainstorm, research, evaluate, and teach using local field trips as a pathway to creating an authentic learning lab that extends beyond the classroom.  The following four steps can start you on the trail of using field trips to inspire and educate:

1.  Brainstorm with a Partner-Plunge.

2.  Research with a Try-Teach-Tour Mindset.

3.  Evaluate Cost vs Compensation.

4.  Teach Kids to Explore & Explain their Expedition.

Create Positive Student Relationships

Struggling to engage all students?  Read below for 5 steps to more positive student-teacher relationships:

1.  Greet them at the door.  Start each day on a positive note.  Try to greet students at the door every day to say hello.  Ask about their evening, morning, weekend. Make a personal connection.  Don't underestimate the importance of "face time".
Student who feel valued will enter the classroom with a positive attitude toward school and learning.  If you are late to class, apologize.  Apologizing might sound like you are giving up authority to the class but really you are earning respect with both students and parents. Earned respect will always grow authentic leadership.  

Sticker chart with area for positive note home:

2.  Send positive notes home.  Use as many ways possible to send home positive notes home.  This is especially important when you have students with behavior or academic challenges.  Their parents may be so accustomed to receiving only negative feedback that they perceive home-school relations as broken.  This is a great way for teachers to embrace technology and use social media such as Remind to reach out to parents.  With Remind messages can be sent to the entire class or to individual parents.  Set up "office hours" within Remind and communicate them to parents so they know when you are available to respond to their messages.  This is a great way to be reachable to parents who are unable to be on campus before/after school while still 
protecting your personal contact information.



3.  Give meaningful feedback.  Common core curriculum lends itself to many varied written assignments.  These assignments may range from short paragraph answers to literary essays and research papers.  Google drive is a wonderful way for students to organize their work and gain 21st century skills.  Google drive is also a forum to give meaningful, personalized feedback.  Always start your feedback with letting students know what you enjoyed about their work.  Then choose 1-2 goals for them to focus on to improve their work. Be careful to keep their goals small, focused, and attainable.  Yes, there may be many errors, yes they may be far from proficient but focusing on small goals helps a student grow their ability to successfully reach goals and improve their work.

An example of feedback given via Google Drive:

4.  Facilitate private discussions about behavior.  Some student behaviors can be frustrating, try to refrain from being caught up in the moment.  This may sometimes be very difficult but remember some students use their behavior to seek attention and affirmation from their peers or even the teacher.  Instead, lower your voice or drop a note on their desk indicating you would like a private discussion.  Most importantly don't forget to have your discussion, even if you need to schedule time for it during independent work time or the next day.  Start your discussion by telling the student that you'd like to find a solution without involving parents.   Ask and acknowledge their ideas for how to change the behavior then find a solution together.   Most students will work with you and for those few students that remain challenging you can share what was already tried at a parent meeting.

5.  Find the good in everyone.  This may sound easy but it can be difficult when you have a particularly challenging student.  Take time to observe the student in a variety of situations (in class, with peers, during recess/breaks, etc).  This need not take a lot of time and chances are if you're doing steps 1-4 you already have some insight.  When greeting the student at the door ask what they plan on doing over the weekend.  In one of your positive notes home ask the student what they would like their parents to read about themselves.  While reading and grading work, look for insights into their likes/dislikes.  During private discussions ask about what they do during down time.  If you're unsuccessful don't give up and keep trying.  The key idea here is to take the personal connection to a deeper level.   That personal connection may be the key ingredient to helping the student.

Plant a Seed of Belief...

It's difficult to tend to the needs of our classrooms when our focus is on standardized test scores. Additionally, many educators misunderstand intervention and use intervention programs as primary curriculum.   The fact is intervention needs to be part of the program along with grade level curriculum.  This chase to close the educational gap may keep students gaps from widening but often do not close the gap and result in keeping children from reaching their potential.  Plant a seed of belief while you use both intervention programs and grade level curriculum.  Tending to a child's self esteem and building confidence is the greatest ingredient into closing the achievement gap which can be seen in the following story:

This was my first year teaching 4th grade and after teaching 1st for the past nine years.  I knew many of the students that were in my classroom.  They were familiar faces from a prior year's 1st grade class, ELD class, yard duty, or a combination of any of these.  Many of the students who were struggling as first graders were still struggling and made very little progress over the prior two years of formal education.  Our school spends much of its time and resources training teachers in a variety of intervention programs then uses the programs as primary curriculum which give the students to have very little, if any exposure to grade level curriculum.  This was definitely the case with "E".

"E" was far behind in academics, especially reading.  He arrived in my classroom reading at a beginning of the year 1st grade level.  He was shocked to hear me say that much of his independent reading time would not be spent on centers or teacher directed activities.  Instead we were spending it reading with a 40 book challenge including specific genres to be reading.  Our first interview, he admitted that he didn't read well and was worried about his ability to read.  I assured him that although I spent much time and resources on accumulating a 4th grade classroom library I still had the books from my 1st grade classroom library and I knew he would find something that interested him and he did.  Starting first with picture books and easy readers.  Then with gentle encouragement he started to read longer books.

He did qualify for intervention and we worked together every day in small group.  During our small group time we used an intervention program, Fountas & Pinnell's LLI system.  During whole group we started the year with a whole-class book club using "Stone Fox" by John Reynolds.  As the months went by he continued to read books of his choice independently, kept up to the best of his abilities with "Stone Fox" and continued meeting with me in small group and individual conferences.   He really enjoyed "Stone Fox" because it was about animals so I encouraged him to try more realistic fiction books about animals independently.

The class  moved from a whole-class book clubs to independent book clubs using The Boxcar Children series.  This series is written at a higher level than "E" was reading but he was so excited to read the books that he kept up.  Because The Boxcar Children books are all written about the same level, I offered more varied levels with our science fiction series.  Because "E" was part of my LLI intervention group I gave those students absolute free choice on the science fiction books.  "E" was so excited he looked at every book jacket of the 5 different title choices and settled upon "Eager" by Helen Fox.  Now "Eager" is a book written at 4th grade level and I knew it would be a stretch for him so during our individual conference I asked him to convince me on how it was the right choice.  I'll never forget what happened next because he so eloquently stated his three reasons why when he said, "I want to read this book because it's about robots and I like robots, I know the book is a push for me but I'm ready to push myself, and most of all because  I want to improve my reading."  I was sold!  He did a beautiful job keeping up with the reading and being prepared for the club "meetings".

I'd love to say that his standardized testing score brought him to grade level but I'm a realist and I know that statistically that is very difficult. He did grow 1.5 grade levels in his reading ability and was so proud of himself at the end of the year.  He began to purchase books from Scholastic book orders and book fairs.  During our end of the year conference I showed him his testing scores and told him that the real win was that he found out he LOVED reading and had accumulated many books to read over summer vacation.  On the last day of school this boy who entered the classroom feeling insecure and unable to read left confident and was looking forward to seeing me after his first day of 5th grade and that is the harvest that comes from planting a seed of belief. 

Quiet Inspiration

Behind every successful person there's a champion behind the scenes encouraging that person to be the best that they can be.  Some of those champions are parents and teachers.  Or they can often be coaches, youth ministers, scout leaders, or other adult leaders.  Sometimes they are your parents friends whom you just saw every once in awhile and their seeds of wisdom encouraged you take that first step to becoming who you were meant to be.  Those people are often not even aware of their importance which was the case with one such friend's mother.

Now it's not that I didn't have great teachers or wasn't encouraged lovingly by my parents or didn't have extracurricular activities because I had all these adults who encouraged me and helped me become who I am today.  I had teachers that taught me to love learning and become a life-long learner.  I had parents who sacrificed so that I could become the first person in my family to graduate from college.  I had coaches who taught me the many benefits of being a good team member and the skill of winning and losing gracefully.  And I had scout leaders who brought me on many outings and taught me the beauty of outdoors and fostered the joy of being a nature lover.  It's just that this one friend's mother who I rarely saw because she was working full-time as well as studying part-time to obtain her own degree stands out as being the person who quietly taught me confidence.

Her daughter and I participated in the middle school scouting program and would often spend time together at one or the other's houses.  Doing what many middle school girls do--listen to music, dance, talk about boys, do homework, hang out, etc.  It was during the times we were at her house that I would have these intermittent interactions with her mother that would change my life profoundly.  I'll forever be grateful to Mrs. H. for helping me gain confidence.  

With my close friends I was very outgoing and chatty however with others, especially adults, I would become shy, my voice would be lower, and I would look at the ground.  Mrs. H would ask me to look at her when I spoke and noticed right away how uncomfortable I was in talking with and looking at her. Mrs. H listened to me, I mean really listened.  She would often say to me, "You have great ideas, don't be afraid to share them with the world".  

One particular time, I recall her complimenting me on my outfit to which I responded, "Oh this is old..." and she stopped me mid sentence, asked me to look at her and very firmly and kindly said, "Michelle, you sound so apologetic, you don't owe anyone an explanation for a compliment, merely look at them and say 'Thank you'."  That one small conversation helped me gain confidence in myself.  Once I let go of explaining my way through a compliment it became easier and easier to simply say "thank you" and the compliments felt more sincere.  Sincere not because they were said any differently but because I thought differently when I received them.  I felt more confident and shed my "explain it away" self.  

I have no idea if Mrs. H knows how much she affected me.  Somehow I think she would prefer, in her own humble way, to not know her profound affect on my life.  Regardless, I still think of her often and the simple act of listening and encouraging was enough for her.  In addition, I think about how powerfully we affect children.  Teachers have great power.  The power to encourage and inspire.  The power to crush and destroy.  Which power will you choose?  I choose inspiration.  It might lead to confidence building in another child.  Maybe I'll never know, too and I'm okay with that.

Seeing is Believing

Envisioning my Success

Now that I know what I want to do in my classroom by resetting my purpose I need to create a vision, literally see it in action.  First I'll start with the purpose statement as discussed in my prior blog:

"To inspire students to explore the world through reading various literary genres and media types to discover and develop their passion in life"

What do I see myself doing to put this into action?  What do I see my students doing?  

It's time for a mind movie {insert harp music and fade to alternate universe, what I call "Michelle's Perfect World"}:

I see a peaceful classroom with all students having access to the books, magazines, and online reading materials of their choice.  Some students are working independently reading books, magazines, or scouring online for articles or using reading apps.  Others are sitting in a small book club group discussing their latest reading selection.  Perhaps I'm in one of the small groups or conferring one-on-one either discussing a book we both read or guiding a student through a selection in the classroom library.  Maybe a student is even giving me a book recommendation and I am taking their challenge seriously.  I see a classroom library overflowing with offerings both classical and contemporary with both books and magazines.  The students iPads have applications geared towards increasing their reading skills, applications for online magazine subscriptions.  Students are free to choose between what hard text offerings are in the classroom or the applications on their iPads or simply browsing book lists and searching online articles to read.  Sounds idyllic.

{FLASHBACK}  How do I even begin to accomplish this?  I've had this dream for years but have lacked the courage to move outside the comfort zone of teacher directed everything.  After all, can I trust the students to be doing what they're supposed to be doing?  Aren't I supposed to be using the curriculum to guide my instruction?  That reality left a lifeless, robotic reading of bored students.  Students who are capable readers and might enjoy their reading.  Then enters The Book Whisperer.

Reading this book opened my eyes to what made me a reader, reading books, lots of books.  Just like in my previous posting moving from first to fourth grade gave me the opportunity to reset my teaching purpose which, in turn, meant I KNEW THE KIDS!  Many of the students I have this year I taught three years ago.  That thought comforted me and gave me the courage to begin to move away from 100% teacher directed reading groups to a reader's workshop format using many of the ideas and suggestions Donalyn Miller outlined in her book.  There, done, vision created:

I envision myself implementing daily reader's workshop with both teacher selected and student selected reading in electronic, book, and magazine format.

This vision is a small step towards letting go and letting children become immersed in a story, so captivated by what they're reading that they don't even realize it's time for lunch.  Now, all I need to do is get the materials and put this into action.