I had the opportunity to attend one of our field trips this week with the kids and I was extremely excited.
We started off the field trip like we normally do by stating our expectations and making sure they were very clear. When we take them off site, we need to have the behave as best as possible and as well as we have to make sure they are safe.
On this certain field trip, we would not keep our voices off, hands to ourselves, and were very disrespectful to the one leading the trip. I was truly embarrassed. This was the first field trip in about five years that it was like this. I was extremely disappointed in them, but I had to find an appropriate way to handle it and figure out exactly why this happened.
I talked with them immediately as we got back onto the bus and let them how disappointed I was in them and talked about the time that our tour guides give to us and you just wasted their time as well. I made them sit silently on the way back on the bus to reflect on their behaviors and about 50% of them fell asleep :)
I knew there had to be a reason behind it, but I had to figure it out. They went on the field trip the next day and did an excellent job so it was a one day thing of exhaustion. SO GLAD!
This is an ever-present challenge...how to balance an orderly and productive environment with the necessary freedoms we all require to learn. It is so important to try to understand the behaviors from the students' points of view. There are a number of really helpful strategies that can help kids have a discussion about that. When we really think about it, they were probably so full of energy and enthusiasm because they were simply so excited about the field trip...even adults have trouble containing themselves in moments like those!
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