Spain Day 50:
I'll be putting up the week 6 and 7 video later on but I wanted to do another written post about the week prior to doing so. Those two weeks are combined because I was changing the blog around and things got a little hectic. It's all good now though.
So this past week I got to go on not one but two different field trips, or excursions as they're referred to here. I was working at the secondary school this week and wasn't expecting to go back to primary so soon but they missed me over there I guess and got to go on two days worth of field trip fun. The first trip was on Thursday and we went to Cosmocaixa, a science museum in Barcelona. If you've ever been to the Exploratorium in S.F, this place was built in the same vein.
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| The Entrance |
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Perhaps the creepiest front dest I've ever seen
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Like any science museum there were plenty of exhibits about the history of man, different ecospheres, and physics. I definitely liked walking around and exploring the different exhibits. One of the perk of being an assistant is that I don't necessarily have to be with the kids all the time. They have their groups and I mostly float around taking pictures and what not. This is great because it gives me a chance to actually see what the exhibits have to offer. I do make sure to take good pictures though, I'm not there just to have fun and ignore the students. I did feel kind of bad on this occasion because though the museum is really cool, it lacks hands on activities that you might find at places like the exploratorium and for kids as young as we hand you need things like that so that aren't limited to looking from a far. Everything was really cool to look at though so it wasn't all bad, and the kids enjoyed it. What I liked the best was the entrance to the actual museum section where you had to walk down a spiraling five story walkway with a tree of life esque model in the middle.
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| The Tree of Life |
There were plenty of wildlife displays as well and I was most interested in some of the fish we saw. Some fish that I had never even seen on the discovery channel were in the tanks we walked past. The fish were my personal highlight as we moved through the tropical rainforest/shallow water zones.
The day went pretty smoothly and it was a nice change of pace from being in the classroom all the time. After walking around all day I still managed to be just as tired as I would've been from a day of teaching. Oh well, it was a much better path to fatigue I'd say. The physics area was really nice as well. There were exhibits about waves, momentum, wind, and centrifugal force, all favorites of mine. The groups walked around seeing the different displays and there was a lunch break in the middle. I think I'm finally adapting to having breakfast at 8 and then another "breakfast" around 10:30/11:00 at school or on field trips. After we ate we finished up with a presentation about the solar system and that was good because the children were sitting and silent. A wonderful combination. Shortly after that we packed on and hopped on the bus back home. I got to walk by that front desk featuring Einstein and some other famous person whose name I can't quite place but it was still creepy.
Field Trip Day 2: Friday was another trip but this time with the older kids. The science museum trip was with the youngest kids, around 3-5, but Friday featured the 7-10 years age group. This time we headed off to a mountain in Mataro that was home to an animal farm and a bakery. The weather is changing as winter nears and this day was particularly cold. For one thing we were at altitude and the other because the sun took longer to get over the ridge so in the shadows it was frigid. Nonetheless, the day was a good experience for me and I had a lot of fun. There were several other schools there so several other students populated the camp with us. It was set up so there was plenty of room for the children to play after walking to each animal location and visiting the room where the bread was made.
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| The view from up top |
The first thing my group did was walk around to see the animals. There were chickens, horses, pigs, and even some ducks along the way. I was walking around with my DSLR in one hand and the GoPro in the other trying to get some good shots for a video. I've been practicing my video editing skills as a kind of side project and I figure with my GoPro why not. I've always like programs like iMovie, but for one thing it takes a while to learn the ins and outs and with my aging computer I can't really multitask if I decide to make a short video. I will keep trying despite these limitations.
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| The rabbits were a hit with the kids for some reason |
We walked up the hill a little ways and there were holding pens for the pigs and horses. Nearby there was a small pond with a bunch of ducks. Apparently the ducks were doing something very entertaining because I heard a lot of clapping but I was busy taking pictures so I didn't see what the fuss was about.
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| Pretty nice surrounding area |
After we saw all the animals, including a cow being milked, we headed back down the hill to prepare for the break making part of the trip. Every year the kids get to make bread and then at the end of the day eat it. The break they made wasn't really to my liking because it comes out of the oven hard and quite difficult to bite through because it's covered in sugar. I like bread that's soft but it was still fun to make.
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| Sugar bread |
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| One girl has celiacs so she got space age cooking materials |
After the bread was prepped and put in the oven we headed down to lunch, and that pretty much concluded the day. I like the format of field trips here. We have activities for some of the day then the last two hours or so is time for the staff to pretty much chill out and let the kids run amuk as they are usually itching to do. After lunch the staff just sat down to chat and the kids played. There was coffee, there is ALWAYS coffee, but I don't drink the stuff. It was good for the others though as it got quite chilly again. I was just practicing my Spanish and helping the teachers with their English while taking some pictures as well.
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| Sergio - Can't see past the shades man |
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| Ariadna |
Once 3:30 rolled around we had to pack up and head to the buses. This trip was even more relaxing than the previous day because we got to sit down for most of it and I had a good time. Maybe in the future field trips back to back I'll try to avoid but this time it wasn't a bad time at all.
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| The beanie came in handy all day |
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