Using the article on this page, you need to write a 5 paragraph essay persuading me to believe your opinion on the article’s question. You need to start by answering the question the article asks. Come up with 3 reasons for why you think this way. Make sure that you use an example from the article to back up each of your reasons. Make a graphic organizer, like a web, on the bottom of this page as your pre-write to help you before you write your paper. You must turn in your pre-write, your rough draft which must be edited and revised, and you must type your essay into the computer on Google Drive. You also must submit your essay on My Access. We will have the Chromebooks in class on Fridays for you to type. You have until a week from Friday to complete the first essay, which is 2 weeks. The rest of the essays you will only have 1 week to complete. We are trying to prepare you to be able to write an essay in 1 or 2 days for our test coming up. This homework will take the place of your spelling homework each week.
Should all field trips be educational?
Let’s say you could choose your class’s
next field trip destination. Would you choose a shopping mall or an art museum?
Would you prefer an amusement park or a play?
More teachers
are choosing to reward students with field trips to places they think kids
enjoy, like the mall or the movies. That means educational field trips to
museums and theaters are declining. Jay P. Greene, head of the Department of
Education Reform at the University of Arkansas, blames this trend on the
pressures of standardized testing. He says teachers want to reward their
students for hard work.
The decline
in what Greene calls “culturally-enriching field trips” will hurt disadvantaged
kids the most. If schools don’t introduce them to museums and other cultural
institutions, they are unlikely to experience them, according to Greene. “Just
as we want our kids to be aware of good literature and good science, we want
them to be aware of good art and good theater,” Greene told TFK. “Museums take kids
out of their narrow worlds and introduce them to new people, places and ideas.”
Greene points
out additional benefits of these “educational field trips.” He did a study of
more than 10,000 students who toured an art museum in Arkansas. The study
showed that students acquired critical-thinking skills even on this short field
trip. “They became more observant,” Greene explained. “They learned to look
closely at art, notice details, and think about what the details mean.”
A trip to an
art museum is the kind of field trip JoAnne Winnick finds valuable. She teaches
fifth grade at Clara Barton Elementary, in Anaheim, California. Winnick says
field trips should be educational, to promote the sciences or the arts. In her
school district, before funding was cut for field trips, fourth graders studied
wetlands at nearby Newport Beach. Fifth graders studied chaparral, a dense
growth of shrubs, in Modjeska Canyon.
On these
outings, students did hands-on experiments. They hiked and observed nature
close-up. Such activities allow students to deepen their understanding of
science concepts they would otherwise learn only from books. “We have limited
time to teach all the standards,” Winnick told TFK. “To take precious time for
reward trips would be most unwise.”
Annica Lowek
is a fifth grade teacher at KIPP Infinity Charter School, in New York City. She
argues that even a fun field trip can be turned into an educational experience.
“Anytime you leave the building, you’re giving kids a chance to practice what
you’re teaching them in school,” she says. “That could be math or science, or
it could be simply learning how to behave on the subway.” Lowek’s students have
experienced all kinds of field trips. They’ve been on camping trips and to an
arcade. Four times a year, they go to a theater in New York City, where they
see plays, operas, musicals and puppet shows. “The kids think the shows are
super fun,” Lowek told TFK. “But teachers know these are valuable learning
experiences.”
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