Fire Museum

Today was an okay day. Today was the field trip I planned to the Fire Museum here in NYC. I planned this trip based on the glowing recommendation of Ms. Down the Hall (a third grade teacher who went last year). She told me how much she enjoyed it. Well, I must not have been playing much attention because what I saw today was not very impressive. Although having had a chance to get out of the building, I shouldn't complain too much.

My class was the last one to leave. So far (for one reason or another), my class has been the last one to leave for a field trip. Today, I decided to get a head start. Those students not joining us on the trip, I sent to other teachers as soon as the teachers agreed. In the past, I didn't send the students until the class was about to leave. Well, early setup didn't help. About 20 minutes before we were due to leave one student showed up with the money and a filled-out permission slip without a signature. I had to wait for that to be faxed signed and returned. Another girl who didn't know if her father was coming or not was sent to anther teacher, but the father was waiting downstairs, so I had to wait for her.

To get the reservation confirmation for all 4 3rd grade classes), I paid for the deposit ($250). We arrived only to discovered the Fire Museum had over booked. Instead of the 3 (rotated) presentations that were promised, they put all 60 students and 10 adults in the room what might have been about 10X15 in size(less of you factor in the displays). Basically, it was a 45 minute presentation about fire safety. Then, in the front there was a firetruck display where the visitors could either sit in the truck and/or push buttons on the sides of the truck...the end. About 11:30AM, they started rushing us out. Ms. Nextdoor started complaining to me (out loud) about feeling rushed and how the trip wasn't worth it. One of the workers there took offense and then they started arguing. One of the workers took escorted the classes to the Rockefeller underground mall where we ate lunch. Since we had about a half an hour to kill before the bus would return, we walked around a bit.

Tomorrow is a city-wide faculty development day, so no students will be in attendance. I was out the door about 3:30PM. I was home by 5PM. On Friday, 3rd grade classes will be going to the Museum of Natural History to see the planetarium show "Cosmic Collision". When admin said that teachers would have to plan our own trips (as oppose to admin doing it), I tried to plan as many trips as I could. What surprised me was that most of the other teachers didn't plan any extra trips. Even the other third grade teachers didn't seem interested in planning trips, but luckily, they seemed excited once the trips were planned. The other teachers probably didn't want to deal with the paperwork and phone tag.



Post Date - Wednesday, June 3, 2009 10:53PM