Field Trips are fun!

Yesterday I took my 30 4th grade students and 22 3rd grade students on their first field trip ever to the Lancetilla Botanical Gardens in Tela, Honduras. With 52 students, Jessie (the 3rd grade teacher) and I were a bit nervous seeing as how this was our first "real" field trip as teachers as well. Our students have been studying plants and plant life cycles throughout the entire 1st quarter and we thought that it would be a great treat for them if they were able to see plants from all over the world in real life. Plus, who doesn't like a field trip :) We planned everything to a tee and hoped for what would be now known as the best field trip ever! However it didn't start off like this...

5:00 AM - Field Trip Day
I wake up to find down pouring rains. It had been raining most of the night and the grounds were a bit flooded. Jessie and I had decided that even if it was raining we would be going anyways because it would be too much of a hassle to try and change the field trip to another day. Plus, no one ever died in a little rain anyway...right?

6:55 AM - School Starts
My kids are super excited for the field trip. They are out of uniform for the day and are thrilled to be leaving La Ceiba! For some of my students, this is the first time they had ever left town. Parents came and waited to see their child put their backpacks away and get on in the bus. They were taking pictures of their kids in line and having them wave back...it was like it was the first day of school all over again. It was adorable I must say....the rain however had not let up. We prepared for the worst though and brought lots of umbrellas!

8:30 AM - Bus Ride
The hour and half bus ride went by rather quickly due to the wonderful 80s music that our bus driver decided to play. We were graced with so many hits that helped to calm our nerves. The rain continued to pour harder and harder but in the distance we were able to see "bluer" skies giving us faith that the rain would stop before we arrived at the gardens.





9:00 AM - Paying the Entrance fee
As we pulled into the gardens the rain stopped miraculously and "Lady in Red" came on the speakers...perfect timing I must say...to give us enough confidence to go and talk (IN SPANISH!) to the security guards of the garden and to pay our entrance fee for 52 students, 10 parent chaperones, and 2 expatriates. We of course had to pay more! I totally busted out my Spanish though and was able to get across my numbers and Jessie helped with the other explanations. Together we made it work and paid enough for everyone to get through.

The rest of the day went extremely smoothly....its almost scary. All 52 students were well behaved and listened so intentively during each of the 4 mini lessons we had planned. They loved the science field trip books we had made that had places for notes and 4 "missions" that needed to be completed while at the gardens. The favorite of the activities: I-SPY roots, stems, and leaves. Jessie and I got a picture of an I-SPY page on the internet and added roots, stems, and leaves for the students to find. Although to us it was obvious, the kids LOVED it. They are obsessed with I-SPY!

What a relief to have the day go so smoothly and as an added bonus, one of the administrators in my school's son is in my class and she was a parent chaperone for the trip. it definitely didn't hurt that she was there and was able to see how AWESOME it was. Jessie and I could tell that she, as well as the other parent chaperones, were impressed.

Jessie and I were such a great team and we definitely can't wait to plan another field trip :)