The Best Field Trip Ever: Fill & Download for Free

The whole point of Zuko having those life changing field trips was to help regain honor and trust between his new groups.I mean, lets look at Aang’s life changing field trip. Yeah, Aang needed to learn firebending from the dragons so he can get over his fear of fire, as well as Zuko needing to find his fuel for fire.But also, Zuko spent two entire seasons trying to capture the Avatar.Sure, they both needed the field trip to learn more about firebending, but the field trip also made Zuko and Aang super close. I think Zuko was at least Aang’s second closest friend (behind Sokka and King Bumi of course). The field trip made Aang see Zuko not as a strict teacher, but as a friend.If I recall correctly, Aang was the first individual to compliment Zuko by saying he’s a smart guy.Lets go over with why Sokka needed the field trip. Yeah, Sokka needed to regain his honor since he failed in solar eclipse invasion plan. But he and Zuko don't have the best relationship. This was their first interaction between the two.Zuko going on the life changing field trip not only help reduce tensions, but it made Zuko more mellow and sarcastic.Near the end of their field trip, Zuko and Sokka were a pretty good team. They managed to hold off Azula.Sokka was also the first individual to toast Zuko for helping other people escape.Sokka was super close to Zuko to the point where he trusted him to tell about what happened to his mother.Look, we can even add Suki to Zuko’s “Field trip”. Zuko tried burning down Kyoshi Island to find Aang, and attacked Suki.Zuko met Suki, which was kind of awkward.But at the end of the adventure, they were close enough to team up with each other and remain on good terms.If we go on the comics (which is canon), Suki admits that she’s worried about Prince Zuko’s health.Suki met Zuko for like 4 episodes, and yet at the end of her field trip she was super close to Zuko to the point where she worried about him.Lets even talk about Katara. Katara probably fought Zuko just as much as Aang, and they both had bad blood between them.Zuko betrayed Katara, to the point where Katara threatened to kill Zuko if he hurt Aang.Katara also didn't trust Zuko even when he saved everyone.But at the end of the field trip, Zuko and Katara made up and became great friends. Zuko helped Katara get closure for her parents death.Now, what does this have to do with Toph? The whole point of Zuko going on life changing field trips was to help regain trust between him and the people he hunted. Zuko burned down Suki’s home, and hunted Aang, Katara, and Sokka across the world.But Toph never even met Zuko face to face. Zuko never hunted down Toph. You can even say that Toph had her life-changing field trip when she met Uncle Iroh.Someone asked me this: Besides Zuko accidentally burning Toph’s feet, what else has Zuko done to Toph? Did he insult her blindness? Did he try to kidnap her (yeah, combustion man was hired by Zuko to kill the Avatar), but did Zuko really try to capture Toph? Did Zuko even fought against Toph before he tried joining Team Avatar?Toph had no reason to mistrust Zuko, since she knew that Azula was ten times worse than him.Why would Zuko and Toph need to go on a life-changing field trip when she was the second person to trust him completely (Appa isn’t a human, and Zuko betrayed Katara’s trust).People are kind of bummed out that Zuko and Toph didn't go on a field trip, but to be honest Zuko and Toph’s friendship is the most underrated in the show.Toph was the only individual to defend Zuko, saying he’s not as bad as Azula or Ozai, and that he was sincere about teaching Aang Firebending, as well as yelling at everyone for not thinking rationally.Instead of mocking Zuko like Katara or Sokka when Zuko couldn’t firebend, Toph was the only individual who offered Zuko some actual good adavice on how to regain his firebending back.Toph was the only person to cheer up Zuko during the Ember Island Play.I guess that's why this moment is super sweet to most fans, because Toph was the only one who defended Zuko from harassment and vouched for him (even though he burned her feet).Yeah, even though Zuko and Toph’s field trip went horribleThey were back to being good friends, with Toph saying it was sweet for Zuko to keep Iroh’s stinky slippers.Sure, Toph didn't get her life changing field trip with Zuko because of time constraints but also… did Zuko do anything that hurt her emotionally or make her angry? Why does Toph need to go on a field trip with Zuko when she was the first individual to trust him?It kind of sucks that Zuko and Toph didn't go on a field trip, but at least their friendship was actually developed and built up.

I’m not sure if this is still a “thing,” but when I was in school, theme parks would have special days, usually near the end of the school year (which was the beginning of theme park season) when they’d encourage schools to bring their students to the theme park at a very discounted rate. The academic hook was that students would perform physics experiments while riding the rides.That is, they’d give students a gravity-measuring device (a weight on a spring in a hollow tube with numbers on the side), have the students ride a roller coaster, then report how many “g’s” they pulled during the ride.My school did this in 8th grade. The theme park… Paramount King’s Dominion in Virginia… was about a 5-hour drive from school. That meant that we got the fancy charter buses, and we left really early and got back to school really late. Those were always the best field trips.When we got to the theme park, we were split into groups. We got to choose our own groups, which meant that I was grouped with the “leftovers” of other guys who were low in the social pecking order. Our chaperone for the day was one of the guy’s dads.I say this now as a teacher and a dad… dads make the BEST chaperones for field trips if you want to have fun. Every time I’ve taken my students on a field trip with parent chaperones, the dads were always the most laid back, “just meet me back at this spot in two hours and try not to get arrested” chaperones.Anyway, we had this pretty big packet of questions we were supposed to answer, and data we were supposed to record from each of about a dozen rides. I didn’t do any roller coasters personally… not my thing… but I did the log flume and a few smaller rides.Here’s the thing that we figured out pretty quickly: you could write whatever you wanted for the data, since it was all based on what you claimed you saw. Or, even better, you could just share answers with groups from other schools who were getting off of the ride as you were getting on, then just enjoy the ride.Imagine a theme park full of 12–14-year-old kids from all around the region, riding roller coasters for “science.” Good times.

Field Trips.Students… my students at least… always tend to be very well-behaved on field trips. And, since I teach in Chicago, we go to some very cool places. Usually, the chaperones (parents and teachers) hang around and chat with each other and enjoy the destination as much as the students.I’ve been paid to chaperone a bunch of well-behaved students to:The Art Institute of ChicagoThe Shedd AquariumThe Field MuseumThe Adler PlanetariumThe Museum of Science and IndustryNavy PierSeveral high-quality playsThe top of the Hancock buildingChinatownA Wendella Boat architecture tourWrigley FieldMillenium ParkVarious cultural museums around the cityThat’s all I remember off of the top of my head. I’m sure there are more.These are all places I’d want to visit anyway. Not only is my transportation and admission paid for (the price for the adults is divided among the students), but I’m also making my normal salary to be there for the day.It’s hard to pick just one that’s more interesting that the others. I really, really like the MSI, Art Institute, and Field Museum. The planetarium and aquarium are still fun, but I’ve done them so many times that they’re losing their “wow” factor for me.The most unique one that I really enjoyed was a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Shakespeare Theater of Chicago. My students were, as usual, so well behaved that I forgot I was working. I thought I was just enjoying a really good play. This particular production was just for students on field trips, and the actors held a Q-and-A session afterwards. There were students from about ten different schools there, and my students asked the best questions and seemed the most engaged. I was really proud of them.Once, I was able to put together a “walking tour” of downtown Chicago for my eighth graders. There were 20 of them, and six chaperones. So I put them in groups of 3–4 with a chaperone, and I “floated” between the groups. We took the El (public transit) downtown, where we went to a few museums, a boat ride, dinner at Maggiano’s, and a visit to the top of the Hancock building.Everywhere we went, I let the smaller groups decide what they wanted to see and go their separate ways, with a meet-up place and time at the end. There was a group chat amongst the adults, if anyone needed me. The chaperones were all in a group with their own child and 2–3 of their children’s best friends. The chaperones were having a blast. The students were having a blast AND learning something.Once the groups split up, I was there, by myself, with nothing to do for an hour or two. Well, “nothing to do” except enjoy wherever we were. The Art Institute was my personal favorite. I remember standing in front of the American Gothic painting, by myself, in the middle of a workday, on the clock, and thinking, “I love my job!”I also love the fact that I can do all of these field trips within the normal seven-hour school day most of the time. I frequently see other school groups on field trips at the same place and at the same time, and some of them traveled several hundred miles just to come to Chicago. They must be doing overnight field trips. That sounds like a nightmare to me. I can show up to work at my normal time, take my students on public transportation to downtown Chicago, spend five hours taking in one or two museums and a lunch, take public transportation back to the school, and leave at my regular time.