Course Module #2

Field Trips In Our Area

Carla Ramdat

SLM 521

December 2004

Objective:

Students will be able to identify and locate online sources for various field trips around their city. Students will gain an understanding of the many things they can learn from field trips.

Objective:

Students will share their knowledge they found online by writing a letter to their principal telling her about one of these field trips they found. In the letter, they should include information about what they can learn from attending this field trip and why they think it is important for them to go.

Information:

Field trips can be a wonderful resource and supplement to any educational setting. They help to expand the information you have studied in class and help you relate that information to real-world experiences. You will be visiting websites to find such wonderful field trips and complete an organizer that focuses on the important aspects of these field trips. You will have an opportunity to write a persuasive letter telling your principal about this field trip and why you think your class should visit the significant place you chose.

Activity:

You will visit the websites listed below of some field trips in your area. Look at each website carefully and think about which one you would like to visit as a class field trip. Choose 1 field trip and complete the chart with the information you read on the website. Click here to retrieve chart. When you have completed the chart, follow the directions under “Assignment” and complete it.

Field Trips

http://www.mcps.k12.md.us/curriculum/socialstd/FT/Field_Trip_start.html This is Montgomery County Public Schools Fieldtrip website. There are lots of wonderful links to field trips related to Social Studies that you can go to within our school’s area.

http://smithsonianeducation.org/ This website for the Smithsonian Museums in Washington, DC. Visit the site to see what the museums have to offer.

http://www.goeft.com/ This is a national listing of field trips. You can type in your city and state and an itinerary will come up of places to visit in that area.

http://www.flamingoedutours.com/slow.html On this site, it lists more places to visit in the Washington, DC area.

http://www.flamingoedutours.com/slow.html Click here to see what you can visit in Williamsburg, VA.

http://www.mountvernon.org/

Here is a link to George Washington’s home in Mount Vernon, Virginia.

http://www.imaginationstage.org/

Here is a link to The Imagination Stage Theater. You can go here to see plays.

http://discoverytheater.org/

Here is a link to the Smithsonian Discovery Theater in Washington, D.C. You can go here to see plays.

Assignment:

Your assignment is to write a letter to your principal telling her about a fabulous field trip you discovered online. You will be using this information from your chart and in the letter, explain why you think you and your classmates should go on this field trip. In it, you must include information about what you think could be learned from visiting this place you discovered. It should contain about 3-4 short paragraphs that are well written. Follow the rubric below to complete this assignment correctly. In the letter, you should also import 3-5 clips from the website you visited to help your principal see some of the activities you can experience on this field trip.

Submission:

After completing the written assignment, you can post your document as an html file to the school’s server and send me an e-mail message containing a hot link and the URL.

Rubric

This rubric is for the letter assignment that you will post on the server.

Aim for a 4

Exemplary

Accomplished

Developing

Beginning

My score

(circle the score)

Your letter is well written and includes the information from the chart. You have imported 3-5 clips to support your information and you shared enough information to convince your principal about how wonderful this field trip will be.

Your paper is written well but only contained a few items from the chart. You also imported less than 3 clips into your document. You also need to include more information to convince your principal about this field trip.

You have a great beginning but more information is needed to see the importance of your message. Also, you could add more clips that support information about your topic.

You have very limited information related to the topic of field trips. You have items missing from your chart, which will help you to have a convincing letter. You need to add clips to support your information.