Field Trip

Azure has a field trip today. Both 6th grade classes will be going to Los Chorros de Tacares. I can’t say I know anything about this location. I checked my Lonely Planet guide and there isn’t any information inside.

I do know they are going hiking then a picnic lunch and swimming in a river. Other than the two teachers, I’m not even sure if there will be other chaperones. But I trust that the kids will have fun! I like that the European School allows for frequent interesting and educational field trips. I think this will be her 6th field trip this school year including the Israel Museum and a working farm.

There is no way the public school system in Big Lake would permit so many field trips let alone a potentially unsafe one such as an unsupervised swim in a river!

The Big Lake Schools took the kids to the MN Zoo every spring as a special treat! Poor kids were divided into small groups of four per adult. The kids were told they needed to stay with the adult for the duration of the time at the zoo which amounted to less than 2 hours including lunch! They could have left earlier in the morning and spent more time at the zoo but decided against it for one reason or another –it probably cut into the total of the amount of time spent in class so they would be shy the allotted time they needed to get their federal funding or some nonsense (maybe they shouldn’t have had so many days off during the school year for supposed teacher workshops!). Anyway, Azure missed most of the animals at the zoo including the dolphin show because the mother she was assigned decided she would rather shop and eat ice cream in the food court! I don’t know why they didn’t give the kids some more freedom? They could have had an adult stationed at each area of the zoo and allow the kids to wander a bit more. But I guess I am too trusting…

All I have to say is that I am glad we left Minnesota!
and
Thank you European School for giving the students more responsibility!