Having the tour of the museum through the eyes of a teacher as opposed to just a museum goer was a great experience. I plan to take my kids though the kids area next time I go now that I know it is there. One thing I have thought about after the tour, was how they break up groups of students. If classes from a whole grade are going on the field trip and they only have 10-15 students in a group while touring, how do they space them out? What do the kids do who are waiting to go through the tour?
I can see myself using the distance learning field trips in my classroom. The VMFA might be a good electronic field trip (as our text book calls it) if there is something specific they offer that you are learning about in the classroom. Our text highlighted the “Teaching With Historic Places” website that I think could be more utilized since it has over 130 lesson plans to complete using the internet but I wonder if this would be geared more toward older students than the young students.
I wonder if doing a class museum in place of a field trip to a museum would be more beneficial to students. Instead of having all the classes in a grade go to VMFA, each class could take a piece of history and turn their classroom into an exhibit for the day. All students would still do all the same learning activities as they would prior to going to the museum but this way they know they are learning the material so they can become an artist for the time period. Each student (or pairs/groups) could choose what piece of art they would like to replicate. They make the art and the short labels for their piece. Their piece and a copy of the original piece gets to hang around the classroom. You could have students rotate classrooms for a period of time and have some type of gallery walk, picture hunt, or some activity that all the students complete in their travels for that day.
I think the big takeaway leads to the theme of the class so far this semester which is that social studies and history needs to be a hands on learning experience. I think this is most important when it comes to the history content area so that students will be able to stay engaged and continue to developed that “want to know” mindset about our past.
Mike, one of the things I really appreciate about your blog posts are the thoughtfulness of your responses. You always point out what you learn and oftentimes brainstorm ideas about how you would apply topics in your classroom. I like the way you think!
One question I would like to address is: If classes from a whole grade are going on the field trip and they only have 10-15 students in a group while touring, how do they space them out? What do the kids do who are waiting to go through the tour?…Typically, if there are a lot of students there will be several docents that will begin the tour at different locations with each group. This is very helpful!