Guest Posted May 11, 2007 Share Posted May 11, 2007 Hi 6:20 am , cue the alarm clock and a bleary eyed Dawn wakes up, jumps in shower in a bid to wake up properly and then gets ready for work. all the time making a mental list of all i need to remember for the dy ahead. 7:30 am arrive to work (an hour ahead of my shift, along with another collegue kindly donating her time prior to her shift start tinme) and begin making sandwiches for twelve children's lunches..... soon discover twelve lots of sandwiches won't fit in the cool bag LOL..... but improvise and eventually have lunch ready. another bad full of goodies and some fruit as we must promote healthy eating 8:00 am, staff begin running round like headless chickens trying to organise their bags for their children in their group..... cue shouts of 'which child do i have','how many nappies do i need', 'where is so and so's hat, coat etc'....... 8:30 bags packed, prams near door, lunch near door..... feed children snack breakfast and toilet visits/nappy change before having a quick blast outside to run of energy. 9:00 Coach arrives,ordered a 25seater and got a 50 seater one.... it was massive so lots of room to spread out LOL.... 9:15 'all aboard' ~ loaded what felt like millions of bags,prams and children on the coach... and the idea of putting a few of the children in the luggage compartment had crossed my mind LOL... seatbelts on and we are off...... 9:30 ~ a few minutes in and shouts of 'did you remember the camera', 'have you got the tickets etc etc' echo round the coach... bags checked and everything is present and correct.... children munch on sweets yum!!!!, read books and chatter about what we can see out the windown and what we willsee at zoo. 10:20 get to zoo, unload coach (again mamouth task), change children who need changing and then go our seperate ways (two groups of three staff and six children each group) agree to meet at agreed point for 12. My group enjoyed the monkey's, how cute!!!!!, before a child wanted to go see the bats... i was not overkeen as they fly loose a few flew right past my face (scary stuff) and we fast tracked it through there.... a few more animals seen and we get the overwhelming feeling that we are walking round in a circle....low and behold we were...... gets to lunch time and for the life of us we can't find the meeting point, i ring the other group who also happen to be 'lost', we find we are 'lost' together in the same place so change the meeting place and sit ourselves down somewhere where we won't be in the way..... cue lunch, which went really well..... nappies and toilets (again!!!!), then off we go for more animal fun..... the children were amazingly well behaved.... the weather was dry all day, rained as we got back on the coach ..... children had fun in the play park, i got stuck up a scramble net with a two year old, and had to go down a slide (don't like slides) and pretend it was lovely (inside i was screaming) LOL.... no accidents, no lost children or staff....got to coach ten minutes late (coach driver not happy), all children fell asleep on way (got a picture of each child sleeping, was so cute!!!!, and staff got a picture of me with my eyes closed!but i was not asleep LOL)...... hour late back, so mad rush to get tea and unpack........ but what a fabulous day, great for staff morale and the children were so interested.... one child kept asking 'is it real' for every animal he saw bless him..... so am shattered now, and need some sleep.... can't wait till next year!!!! Dawn Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 11, 2007 Share Posted May 11, 2007 Wow what a great day! Well done for surviving AND enjoying it! I love going on trips xxx Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
belle06 Posted May 11, 2007 Share Posted May 11, 2007 wow how fantastic can I ask what age children you took we usually do two trips a year but are having issues raised about our younger children and car seats and seat belts hoping you have some pearls of wisdom of how you managed. Really do not wish to stop our trips so would love to hear if you came across any problems/ concerns! Michelle Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hali Posted May 11, 2007 Share Posted May 11, 2007 oh wow sounded brilliant Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 11, 2007 Share Posted May 11, 2007 Dawn, thanks for that account of what sounded to be a great day! Well done you!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 11, 2007 Share Posted May 11, 2007 I really enjoyed reading that Dawn - and could picture it all in my head! What a brill day. So often it can be off putting to organise a trip, and often they get missed out - so well done for all your hard work. The children muct have loved it. Have fun looking at all the photos together next week! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 12, 2007 Share Posted May 12, 2007 Dawn sounds like a lovely day, Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 12, 2007 Share Posted May 12, 2007 HI, prior to the trip weput out letters asking parents who would be interested in a trip, this helped us see what numbers we would be looking at. The youngest child we took was 16 months followed by another at 18 months then five children aged 2 and a half, and 1 child aged 3 and 4 children aged three and a half to four years. we booked a coach that had lap style seat belts fitted, as coach seats don't accomodate car seats this was the best option, and actually the lap belt were very secure. (parents were informed from the outset that there would be no car seats) We sat children strategically, ie a younger one next to a staff member, the pre-schoolers who we knew could be relied upon sat on the back row with a staff member in the middle of them. All children were warned they had to keep seat belts on and stay sat down, and all children had staff eyes on them at all times!!! ..... to be honest the children were far more interested in being on the coach, looking at what they could see and anticipating what we would see at the zoo..... so no one played up... we took books on the coach to read if children got restless, and these were really useful and since the coach was staying all day it wasn't a problem leaving them on the coach as we went round the zoo. we offered the trip to all ages, (babies to pre-school) but no babies came, parents did express some concerns of not having car seats and i think this is why babies did not come. Had babies of come we would of just again sat them strategically, ie next to a member of staff. so tips: go on your trip on a friday, staff and children will need a weekend to recover plan ahead !!!!! LOL.... I had allocated children to staff, all staff knew who they had and took responsability in preparing thier bags (ie packing spare clothes and nappies) Keep to a one to two ratio if possible, anymore would have been chaos!!!! and more like crowd control rather than a trip to the zoo ..... we saw a school there who were on a oneto four ratio and im not kidding you the children were running round and hardly being watched by adults it was quite a worry!!!. be flexible..... i.e we had decided who would be in prams and who would walk (pre-school children walking) half way through the day pre-school children shattered, so younger children were removed from their prams to walk whilst pre-schoolers had a rest in prams!!!!!!!.... and it was actually nice to let the little one's walk for a while too. and stay calm!!!! it wasn't worth getting stressed about!, if they didn't eat lunch then we were fine, if they wanted to see the sea lions for half an hour then fine again.... we didn't stress.... we ignored moans and groans that we were blocking the viewing screens (twelve children do take up a lot of room LOL) and we stayed calm, we generally enjoyed it and so did the children also we helped one another out, we didn't just think these are my two children so im only going to deal with these we shared tasks. we navigated the zoo in two groups but kept bumping into each other so in the end stayed together.... which was nice for staff morale..... one staff member commented it was like a day of work... she was clearly enjoying herself. i think its kind of like once you make the decision to do it you just do it and it really was lovely... tiring but lovely, i was in bed by 8 pm last night and woke at 9:30 this morning, must have needed it Dawn wow how fantastic can I ask what age children you took we usually do two trips a year but are having issues raised about our younger children and car seats and seat belts hoping you have some pearls of wisdom of how you managed. Really do not wish to stop our trips so would love to hear if you came across any problems/ concerns! Michelle Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 12, 2007 Share Posted May 12, 2007 Can't wait to see the photo's, must sift out the one of me with my eyes closed on the coach LOL, before it gets enlarged and put on nursery door.... also there is a great shot of my bum as im climbing the cargo net!!!! hmmmm nice LOL..... i will personally be murdering my new senior if she thinks of putting those photo's up Dawn I really enjoyed reading that Dawn - and could picture it all in my head! What a brill day. So often it can be off putting to organise a trip, and often they get missed out - so well done for all your hard work. The children muct have loved it. Have fun looking at all the photos together next week! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest MaryEMac Posted May 12, 2007 Share Posted May 12, 2007 Sounds as if you had a brilliant day Dawn , thanks for sharing it with us. Mary Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 13, 2007 Share Posted May 13, 2007 apparently between the two groups we took 93 photographs of the trip, hmmm, wonder where we are going to display them all Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 14, 2007 Share Posted May 14, 2007 Sounds great Dawn, it's been a while since I did a large group outing, maybe I just will this year, who knows. As for the pics just put to CD and show on laptop via picture screen show, bet the cildren will love to look at them as much as the parents. Peggy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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