10 Feb Our First Field Trip to The Play Street Museum

I saw this great statistic the other day circulating among homeschoolers on Facebook.  It compared the amount of time public schooled children spend on their studies as compared to homeschooled children. The logic was that children attending public school spend 180 days in school for 12 years of their life. This is equivalent to 2160 days or 5.9 years of school.  Homeschoolers, on the other hand, are in their learning environment every day, all year round.  The message was RELAX!  We’ve got 18 years to accomplish 5.9 years of school!

Don’t you love that?  I am acutely aware that I am still tied to the public school way of thinking, and I really struggle to be free from it.  It’s probably a homeschool-newbie trap and as we gain experience and confidence in what we are doing, we will grow in this area.  We still tend to be very task-oriented and very focused on desk-time and assignments, both of which my children would be happy to avoid completely!  However, we are learning and I know that as we become more relaxed about our homeschool, it will become more enjoyable.

Field Trip to Play Street Museum

In the spirit of relaxation and enjoyment, we scheduled our first field trip to the Play Street Museum with a couple of friends.  This place is a child’s dream come true!  It is a child-sized town, with all of the important buildings and business, including a bank, a fire department, a grocery store, a restaurant, a doctor’s office, a veterinarian’s office, a school and a home.  Each building is fully equipped with toys to be operational.   As a kid, I think I would have thought I’d died and gone to heaven in this place.

We thought we were brilliant because we planned to arrive right at lunchtime when everyone else was leaving for lunch.  And yes, that’s exactly what happened.  It was practically empty!  Luci went straight for the Fire Department.  There were firefighter clothes and a slide to play on, so she dressed right up and jumped on the slide!  Clark was first drawn to the Animal Hospital, where he rescues all the stuffed animals from their cages.

There is an area for each child’s interests!

Clark’s favorite spot to play was in the art section.  I would love to set up something like this at home, so he can express his artistic side any time he wants! It included pens, pencils, crayons, paints, glitter glues, stamps, scissors, paper.  Literally everything you could possibly need to create.

You can always find Luci close to her big brother.  If Clark is going to the art table, so is Luci!  She created her own little creations, using a couple of things she’s never used before.  We made an apple tree with lots of cut out apples.

Clark discovered that blue glitter glue was a great way to make water.  Both Clark and Luci played at the chalkboard.  There was no chalk, just water, which was an interesting and new way to “paint.”

Once we were done with art, it was time for lunch.  Luci was the “cooker” at a burger joint.  She attempted serving, too, but we found that she was far too opinionated about what her customers should be ordering.

After a delicious banana split, we decided we needed to get groceries.  We went next door to the grocery store where Luci found some ice cream.

She also realized that it was very, very difficult to manage a cat, a baby and a cart while trying to get groceries!  I was instructed in no uncertain terms that I needed to look after the baby while Luci filled the cart.  We got lots of fruits and vegetables.

Experiencing a hint of public school!

We finished up the day playing with Legos and magnetic puzzles.  Clark and Luci could have played at those all day, but they were getting tired. Tired kiddos do not make for a pleasant evening, so we began to wind things down.  We finished up in the little school room.  Luci wanted to be the teacher, so she taught us how to sing the ABCs.  Unfortunately, Clark was not interested at all in sitting in a class. He was a little unpleasantly surprised when he learned that kids in public school have to sit at desks like this for much of the day!

This was a fantastic field trip; I would love to go back!  It would be a great place to go to when we are discussing community helpers in one of our upcoming Five in a Row books.