Little Explorers

Yes, I know this should have been posted a long time ago since our field trip was March 24^th.  Better late than never, I guess!

The day started out quite uneventful.  The kids that were going were excitedly talking to each other and waiting for our 8:00 departure.  We talked a bit about behavior on the bus, especially sitting down, and behavior once there.  I reminded them that we were going to a mall, which is a public place, and that they needed to represent ENS Al Ain City Campus well.  They all knew exactly what that meant as they were able to tell me: “no shouting, no running, walk in a line, and listen.”  The question would be would they actually do it?

Sixteen excited kids and I boarded the bus headed for Dubai at 8:05.  Not too bad, if I say so myself.  The ride began as any other field trip ride would have begun: kids chattering and looking out the windows.  I’m not sure exactly when it happened, but we were on the Dubai-Al Ain road when Mubarak came to me asking for a garbage bag.  He had thrown up.  Poor kid.  I sent him back to his seat and got him the garbage bag and told the driver to pull over so he could get off.  The driver looked at me like I was crazy, but pulled over nonetheless.  I got off the bus with Mubarak, telling the kids to remain seated, and tried to clean him up the best I could with tissues.  I had him take off his school shirt; luckily he had an undershirt on underneath.  We got back on the bus and I opened the windows in the back and had him move to the front.  I asked the driver if we could stop at a petrol (gas) station so he could get some water and get cleaned up better.  He said he needed permission from Mr. Rabeeh (transportation guy).  Well I didn’t have his number so I called Brian, I figured the principal superseded the transportation guy, and got permission from him.  So we stopped at the nearest, and of course smallest, petrol station.  Mubarak and Mohammed went in the bathroom and got cleaned up as best as possible while I went in and got him a bottle of water.  With Mubarak cleaned up, his school shirt rinsed off, and seated up front we continued our journey to Dubai.

As soon as we reached Dubai the kids got all excited.  You would have thought that they had never been there before!  Looking out the windows, asking “is this Dubai?” taking pictures, and excitedly chatting.  Crazy.  They spend just about every weekend in Dubai and here they are acting like it’s their first time.  We arrived at Mirdif City Center shortly after Vemal, at around 9:30, who didn’t have to stop twice for a sick child.  The kids did fairly well walking around the mall.  No questions as to stopping and shopping, which totally surprised me.  They didn’t really walk in a line, but it didn’t bother me.  They weren’t running and the mall wasn’t open yet so it wasn’t a huge deal.  Vemal really wanted them to be in a line though so we tried.  His class did much better than mine.  I guess that’s because my class could tell that I didn’t really care because usually they are amazing at walking in a line.  We got to Little Explores, which is right by Fly Dubai and the kids wanted to go there instead, and they formed a line to get their colored vest which would keep them in a group.  The people at Little Explorers totally took over, which was nice.  They took them around to the various centers and led the activities. 

The first thing they had to do was build a house with foam bricks.  The girls did the bottom and the boys did the top.  They loved it!  Running around to find the right size block to fit in the specific hole or how they could combine blocks.  I think as much fun as they had building the house they had twice as much fun breaking it.  Cleanup, on the other hand, wasn’t much fun.  Typical though, but we did get all the blocks back where they were supposed to go.  They then went through some jungle zigzagging thing to get to the maze, which really wasn’t a maze for them since they could see over the top.  They went through the maze and walked on wobbly “stones” to work on their balance.   They did this a few times and you could really see who had good balance and those that almost had to hold on.  It was funny to watch because it’s geared towards young kids and there were some that were struggling.  Their balance hasn’t developed yet.  There were a few who figured out it would be easier to just run along side the wobbly “stones” to get back to the maze.  Good problem solving!  They went to a water and air area next where a few of them came out soaked!  Just like taking Alexa and Mason to the science museum and letting them play in the water.  Kids will be kids no matter how old they are!  We finished the rest of the activities and headed out into the mall for lunch.

 

Lunch was at an Italian café where they had chicken parmigian and juice.  After lunch we headed to Cold Stone Creamery for ice-cream.  The kids that didn’t want ice-cream went to the store at Little Explorers while the rest ate their ice-cream.  After ice-cream and shopping it was time to start walking back to the bus.  We needed to be on the bus by 1:00 so we could be back to school by 2:30.  The walk back through the mall wasn’t as nice as it was on the way in.  A line was pretty much necessary this time as the mall was open and getting crowded.  The kids didn’t want to walk in a line; no surprise there.  After stopping a few times to make sure we had everyone we made it back to the bus and began our journey back to Al Ain at 1:05.  Only 5 minutes late.  No problem.  As soon as we got on the bus Suhail told me he had to go the bathroom.  Great timing!  I told him to try to hold it and I’d see what we could do; I was hoping he could make it back to school.   No luck there.  He couldn’t even make it to a petrol station.  He did make it to the Dubai-Al Ain road, but I had to have the driver pull over so he could get off the bus and go to the bathroom.  Easy for a boy and 20 seconds later we were driving again!  Other than that the ride back was uneventful.  Mubarak sat in the front so he didn’t get sick.  The kids were tired and a few of them slept while a few others played with the toys that they bought.  It was a nice ride back.  We made it to ENS at exactly 2:30. 

What a nice way to start the last week before spring break!