Do You Really Count Field Trips as School?

I don’t often join in on the Blog Cruise but how could I resist after learning that this week’s topic was all about field trips? If you’ve stopped by my blog before, you know I love field trips! I even host a weekly meme called Field Trip Friday where I invite readers to join me by linking up and sharing the neat places they’ve been to each week.

I love to learn outside  the home and even though my kids are older, we’ve had no shortage of field trip opportunities. Recently we were able to tour the Tiffin Motor home Plant, step foot on replicas of the Nina and Pinta and visit the Tennessee Aquarium with friends on the Homeschool Day. Though I love field trips and don’t have a problem counting most of them as school, I know some of you would disagree. You can read my philosophy on field trips at Why Read About it? Let’s Do It!

I incorporate field trips for the following reasons:

1) Field trips make learning come alive for my children.

2) Field trips often enhance a subject that we are currently studying in our home.

3) I use field trips to introduce and build interest in a subject that we will be studying.

4) In the past, I have used field trips to help meet requirements set forth by our state. (Example visiting the local fire department and learning about fire safety.)

5) Field trips allow my children to interact with other students and families ensuring that they are properly socialized. (As if that were really a problem.)

6) Now that my children are older, we often go on field trips that increase their knowledge in various career options.

Field trips have allowed my children to experience firsthand what we’ve read about in books, while opening my children’s eyes to the diversity, culture and history of this great nation.

Some of my families favorite field trips have been trips that we’ve taken as a family. Those include trips to Colonial Williamsburg, Washington DC and our spring trip to The Alamo.

As a group with other homeschooling families we’ve enjoyed visiting Jerry Brown Pottery, visiting our State Capital when we lived in Ohio and meeting our Congressman Jim Jordan and touring Thomas Edison’s Birthplace and Museum in Milan, Ohio.

What field trips have you taken with your children? What is your favorite trip and why?