Blog Post 7

All in all, the field trip we went on to the museum was pretty disappointing for me. I thought it was a great trip in theory. After doing the readings I understand the value of getting outside of the classroom and exploring the content in new ways but the trip to the VFMA fell short of this. I think this for a few reasons.

I believe that the first part of the tour was informative enough to use in a classroom and helpful. I liked that the kids could see the history they are learning about in front of them and that the museum has tours that match the content of specific grade SOLs. I also liked the activities prompting students to think in three concrete steps in relation to what they were observing. I think this promotes advanced thought processes that are crucial in reaching full understanding of social studies. As much as I liked the second part of the tour in theory, I have never been more bored in my entire life. The women explaining it kept talking about how great it was that there was all this quiet time just observing and I could not imagine being a kid and having to stare at a painting for so long being asked the same few questions over and over again just using different words. At that point, it was hard to imagine students truly focusing on this activity. I also didn’t like that the museum’s materials were meant only for older students. I was hoping to be able to access something like them for my own classroom one day but hearing that was disheartening and confused me on the reason I was there.

This trip showed me how I felt about different aspects of out of classroom excursions. I enjoy the constantly active and struggle to understand the more inactive.  The importance of observation though and the ability to develop observational skills is crucial to students especially upon entering middle school. Perhaps I should think about ways to incorporate the less active into my classroom but maintain a fun and engaging environment.