Fieldtrip of the Moving Image

Last Friday I planned the MOST FUN FIELDTRIP OF THE YEAR, or at least that’s what I taught my kids. We were organized to head into Astoria, Queens to visit the Museum Of The Moving Image, and caustic as ever, many of my little darlings complained that “we only went to museums” and that “they sucked.” I had to hold back a laugh, since the MOMI was only the 2nd trip our class had taken to any museum.

I spent all of last week hyping up the museum, telling my students how so much of the museum was hands on, and how much fun it would be…and for the most part my enthusiasm helped because I had seven students arranged to go on the trip. (I’m used to four students per trip, many opting out in order to smoke up somewhere or get in trouble with the law.) So let’s just say I was incredibly excited to be brining my kids somewhere fun, somewhere exciting, and somewhere out of Brooklyn and their school.

Friday morning I woke up with a head full of lead filings. Sick. First bad cold since I’d moved to Brooklyn over a year ago. Disbelief, disappointment and feelings of what now? Bubbled in my head just like the snot in my nose. Gross image, sorry. I even flirted with the idea of calling in sick.

No way. I just couldn’t. I rallied through a 45 minute shower, trying to clear my head. I downed some Dayquil and mustered up as much strength as I could to face the day. When I walked into school and got all the paperwork together for the trip a colleague asked me why I didn’t just cancel the trip. I was aghast! After all the time I spent talking about it, and how excited I imagined the kids were under their public persona of cool disregard for all things academic? I couldn’t back out now! Besides, it was Friday, and I could coma through the entire weekend and feel better on Monday.

Surprisingly, for the amount of teenagers we brought on the trip there were few snafus. Again, there were a few turnstile jumpers, but it didn’t seem so bad since we all had a school pass to get through free anyway. Why do kids do that sort of thing for attention?
It took just under an hour to get to the museum by train, with several blocks of walking once we got to the surface. The students certainly complained about that.

Diva Student: Ms. C? (Very loudly) Ms. C? How come you always makin’ us walk everywhere? I’m COLD and TIRED! Why didn’t we take the bus?!

Ms C: I asked you guys about the bus, you said yourself you “didn’t want to take no Fing cheese box.” If you like, next time we’ll bus it.

If you’re reading this blog, and you’re looking for an AMAZING place to take your students, taken them to the MOMI…it’s a lot of fun, and your kids will thank you. My kids especially liked the Linda Blair Exorcist robot, but I think that’s because they’re all a little possessed. Ha ha, just kidding. Even though it’s way uncool for teens to show any joy or pleasure in school related activities there was a giant movie camera from 60 years ago that stopped my students in their tracks. “Whoa!” was their consensus, and I felt a little smug about it. In fact, when it was time to scram, I actually had trouble getting the students to leave. Mind you, it was in the video-game room, but knowing that even if the students wouldn’t admit to it, they enjoyed the trip.

We ended the trip by stopping at a nice diner and getting the kids lunch, and it was a pleasure, even in my doped up state, to sit and eat as a “family.” Only one student was rude to the waitress, but other than that no one would have known these kids were special ed. And isn’t that the point?