First Field Trip

Today I went with first grade on a field trip to the zoo-the first field trip anyone at our school has gone on in over two years. Field trips now are pretty much the same as they were pre-pandemic:

• semi-trucks still honk their horns when a bus of first graders pump their fists up and down
• kids still want to eat their lunch at 10:30 a.m.
• one kid in your group is still ready to go back to school by 11:00 (“The bus isn’t coming to get us until 1:30, so we’re going to look at a few more animals.”)
• one kid in the group is still determined to wander away (if only I had a dollar for every time I said “Where did ______ go?” today)
• kids still have just as much (or more) fun playing tag in a field as they do looking at the animals
• one group is still late getting back to the bus
• parent chaperones still agree that it was hard enough keeping track of 4-6 kids and still have no idea how teachers manage an entire class
• happy, exhausted kids still fall asleep on the bus ride back to school
• teachers still marvel at how much work field trips are, but know that they are worth it!