Anonymous wrote:Our daycare center announced a field trip for the preschool room to the National Zoo for late June. Our child has been in the room since January; this is the first field trip they will be going on since we started there in the infant room. This will be a trip of up to twenty kids who are mainly 3 years old - they typically range from old 2s to young 4s in the room - who span from being not potty trained to nearly self sufficient on the potty, with most somewhere in between (the teachers send them to the toilet on a 30 min timer in the room on a daily basis). The center has two buses, and my guess is that none of these kids has ever been on the center's buses. The zoo is a 40 min ride one way, and the trip is planned for 9:30am-1:30pm, eating lunches brought from home while there.
I asked the room's lead teacher today how logistics work to take twenty kids in that age group on such a trip. Her answer was "lots of volunteers", that they will take everything with them regarding dealing with potty accidents, and that she would prefer kids to be in pull ups in case of accidents. She also admitted that she has never done a field trip like this before and that it was the center director's idea. The lead teacher has been in charge of that room since we started there in 2019.
Is it just me, or does this sound like a really bad idea?
My day care also took preschoolers on a trip to the zoo in the 90 degree heat.
I volunteered to drive my son and his friend to ensure their survival. Everything went fine but we took lots of breaks and sat under the shade to keep cool.
Looking back, it seems a bit too ambitious for a preschool class.