Field Trip Planner: Fill & Download for Free

Field trips are a NIGHTMARE.As a teacher in an incredibly high poverty area, I believe that my students NEED the experiences that field trips can provide. Last year alone, I took my students to the ballet, to a musical, and to a storytelling festival. For the most part, the kids loved the experiences and we had a great time.However.The logistics of planning the field trip, and everything I had to do before it, were awful. There is no money in our budget for field trips. I had to figure out the total cost of the trip - including paying the bus driver and gas for the bus (and it would have been more if we had left the county and I had to rent an activity bus, which are not always available and competition to get one is high) and divide it by the number of students going on the trip, and then ask each student to bring in their share.I asked students to bring in $8 each. About half of them did, which left me $160 short. Guess where that money came from? If you’re thinking my pocket, you’re partly right! I paid part of it, and was able to convince our PTA to pay the rest. However, two years before this year I didn’t accurately estimate the amount of money needed for gas for the bus, and was presented a BILL at the end of the year for the difference.Then there were the permission slips. Not only couldn’t I get the kids to bring in the money, I couldn’t get them to bring the permission slips either. I didn’t want any kids feeling like they couldn’t go, so I told them from the beginning that I needed the permission slips back even if they couldn’t pay the money, and that I would worry about where to find the money. On a DAILY basis I had to ask half of my kids where their permission slips were. Three kids didn’t bring them until the day OF the trip, and two kids didn’t bring them at all. Of course they burst into tears when they were told they couldn’t go. We ended up calling their parents and thankfully they were able to stop by the school and sign the forms. I sent the forms home two MONTHS in advance. I gave these students MULTIPLE copies. I wrote it in their planners. I wrote notes home. Maybe I should have called the parents sooner, but my kids are in 4th grade. They should be developing some responsibility, and it really should have been their job to get the form signed.Then there are behavior issues on the field trip itself. I have certain students who I do not want to be legally responsible for out in public. The year before last I had a student who had been horribly abused and raised by absolutely deplorable people. His issues were beyond my ability to comprehend, much less deal with. He needed professional help. His behavior was so out of control and so dangerous that I refused to take my class on any field trips that year. I don’t know if that makes me a bad teacher or not. I am not allowed to leave anyone behind for behavior reasons unless it is a PBIS field trip. So anywhere I go, I have to take ALL of my students - even the ones whose behavior scares me. Sometimes I can wrangle their parents or guardians into attending to keep an eye on them, but sometimes I can’t, and I spend the whole field trip terrified that a fight will occur or the student will run off.In addition to those specific students, there are the behavior issues of the class as a whole. Most of my kids have never seen a play before. They don’t know how to behave in a theater. I spend weeks preparing them, talking about what it means to be a good audience, role-playing what we do and don’t do … but sometimes it doesn’t stick. I think back to our own performances at school - the Christmas program, the Night of the Arts - and how their own parents behave in the audience - talking through the performances of any grade they don’t have a child in, talking while our principal is giving announcements, surfing on their phones instead of paying attention - and I start to understand why their behavior is the way it is. MOST of my kids do great, but there are always a few who don’t control themselves.If I was not solely responsible for planning the field trips, paying for them (at least in part), and if I had more involved parents who would attend as chaperones, I would probably love field trips. I really do think they are valuable for my kids, and that’s why I keep doing it. But I don’t particularly like them, and every time we get back to school I say, “Never again.”Until the next time I get a flyer for a play and think, “OMG, the kids HAVE to see this!”

Today:me: *stares at large stack of papers to grade. I have a computer on my lap and I’m working on lesson plans. I have my planner open. I have water in one hand and pain killer in another. I have a raging headache. I don’t feel well*“I need to grade all these papers”Husband: “how can I help?”I ain’t even lying y’all. How romantic is that? I didn’t even ask. Just sitting here sniffing, blowing my nose and praying I get well before I take my whole class on a field trip tomorrow.My husband is the ultimate educator’s husband.

I would say pebblar! (www.pebblar.com)But dont take my word for it, google “itinerary maker” and we are consistently in the top 3 on page 1 of the research results.We created pebblar as a DIY trip planning tool for independent travellers.How pebblar works is that it is based off Google map (with supplementary data feeding from Rome2Rio) BUT the key thing is we removed some of the limitations of Google map (e.g. Google map maxes you out at 10 places and show you a total driving time instead of each segment driving time). So basically, we made road trip planning/mapping easier and more flexible!On top of that, we added notes field under each location so you can add free-text notes which is actually quite essential in DIY trip planning.Pebblar gives DIY trip planners the tool to map out multiple stop trips with the ability to add their own notes for each stop.