First Field Trip of the Year!

Yesterday we went on our first field trip of the new school year. We started doing the Kansas City Passport to Adventure last year. The Passport is a booklet that you pick up at one of the partipating locations and get stamped. Each location has a question to answer. After the child answers the question, they get a small prize, like sticker, a pin, a ruler, etc. The locations are all Museums, Living History Locales, or Nature Conservatories; which means they are all educational. If the child gets stamps at 15 of the 22 locations before the end of October, they send in their passport for a prize package. We tried to do the passport last year, but didn't complete the required stops to get the kids their prize package in time.

This year, we got in on the first day of the Passport to Adventure at our last Co-op field trip to Missouri Town. The summer did not go as planned, so until yesterday, the kids still just had one stamp on their passports. My friend, Colleen, and her kids are working on their passports, too. She suggested we go to two places yesterday. We agreed, so we all packed pinics and set out for Burr Oaks Woods Conservation Nature Center and Kemper Outdoor Education Center.

I think my kids were a little disappointed that the Conservation Center no longer had the giant log inside to play puppets, but that did have a cool giant frog that we took pictures on. We walked the Tree Trail at Burr Oaks, along with the Guide and Activity Sheet from the mailbox at the beginning of the trail. I think everyone had a great time; although we were all sticky and sweaty by the time we finished the trail. The worst part was the bugs that invaded our picnic: giant ants and daddy-long-legs spiders.

At Kemper Outdoor Center, the butterfly garden was gorgeous. There were quite a few interesting things to see inside, but the kids all like the black cat that was running around. The most interesting thing for me was the frogs and the GIANT tadpoles. These tadpoles "heads" were at least as big as a child's fist!! I'd never seen tadpoles that weren't smaller than my own fingers (at least not that I remember!). The tadpoles were inside of a beautiful goldfish pond.

I should've had Ellie take the waterbottle out of her scooter pocket. I do not look like myself. Those are my old glasses, but I wear them often with the kids. They are very sturdy.

Two field trips in one day, and more school when we got home (as requested, or rather begged, by the children) is my idea of a pretty good day of school!