A field trip for your class can be a fantastic experience that’s remembered by so many and appreciated massively by the kids. However, the planning stages are so important. If you do too little, it’s more than likely going to end up in trouble.
There are also many mistakes that are commonly made time after time. If you can avoid these to begin with, you’re going to be on much firmer footing and more likely to successfully run the field trip that you had always wanted. So, here are some mistakes to sidestep.
Not linking it to learning
The whole point of a field trip is that people are supposed to be learning something. So, when you’re looking at places for field trips, you need to have a clear learning link in there. Ideally, it’ll be based on your current curriculum, and you’ll be able to give your kids a better understanding of a particular topic. This works particularly well for a subject like history if you’re able to take them to a certain historical site of interest or museum, for example.
Planning it last minute
When you’re taking a whole class of kids with you, the planning needs to be spot on. Not only is there the venue to book, but you also need to sort out the transport, getting permission from parents etc. If you leave all this until the last minute, you’re going to seriously struggle to get everything sorted in time.
As such, it’s much more likely that something will go wrong that you need to sort out. Therefore, planning needs to be right at the heart of what you’re doing, as well as giving yourself enough time to do every element properly.
Not getting enough support
Many field trips involve the support of several staff members. Therefore, you need to make sure that you ask them well in advance and get the support of as many staff as you need. Also, there are the field trips that include the support of parents as well. If you have kids in the class that need specialist support, it’s certainly worth enlisting help sooner rather than later.
Ultimately, it’s not such a bad thing to have too many people on the trip rather than too few. Again, this comes back to ensuring that you have allowed plenty of time in the planning stages and don’t leave everything right down to the wire.
Not planning activities
As part of the overall field trip, you also need to make sure that you’re planning plenty of activities that will help out with the learning. Sometimes, this will simply involve getting in touch with the venue as they’ll often have guides and people who can directly help out with the running of the field trip.
On other times, it means preparing some specific activities that can be completed during the course of the trip. Again, this can help with the solidifying of the learning and making sure that the trip runs well.
Failing to learn for the future
As well as you’ve planned out the trip, there are bound to be elements that could have gone better. Therefore, you need to plan out exactly what these are so you can make improvements next time. This is especially true if you’re planning on running exactly the same trip to the same venue in the future. However, no matter whether this is the case, there are still bound to be some improvements that are ready and waiting to be made.
Not getting all permissions
Permission needs to be granted for the kids to go on the field trip in the first place. Therefore, you need to make sure that you’re getting these well in advance. This way, you can all go on the trip without any last-minute panics or risks that people are going to end up getting left behind when they don’t need to be.
Field trips can be highly stressful times for a class, but they can also be the most fun and memorable events of the school year. Therefore, you should aim to avoid all these mistakes to ensure that the trip goes as smoothly as possible.
Of course, as has already been mentioned, there are more than likely to be some elements that go wrong and can be improved. Keeping these down to a minimum is important, but so too is learning where improvements can be made in the future for the good of other classes.