Field trip! Urban Delaware River

This morning we had our second field trip. We visited the Coast Guard Base on Columbus Blvd to experience the fire department's fireboats. Tide was almost out, so we had to walk down a steep ramp to the floating dock. Two ships were tied up at the dock- a brand new pumping boat and a 60-year old workhorse which we were told helps the Coast Guard chop up ice floes in Winter. We boarded the pump boat and the groups went up one by one into the wheelhouse to hear the pilot speak. I kept an eye on deck, so Cindy will have to elaborate. While the groups waited their turn I tried to engage the kids in thinking about what they saw along the river and how it was different from our previous ship. The children were very excited to see ducks, seagulls, and a very small school of fish in the water.
After the talk the pilot asked the engineer to start up the pumps. The boat has three spray nozzles: one on the bow of the boat which swivels left and right, one at the stern which swiveled up and down and left and right, and one very large one on top of the wheelhouse that shot the water nearly straight up. The students had great fun taking turns controlling the direction of the spraying water, pretending to put out fires. It was even more impressive when all three nozzles were going at full force!
After that great adventure, the pilot took us on a tour of the rest of the pier. We looked at a buoy boat which checks on and places red and green buoys in the river to direct the boat traffic. We also saw various police boats. Some were very small and fast, others had removable sides for aiding in rescue and to allow divers to ease into water. We saw a Pilot boat which takes a pilot out to a ship to steer a foreign ship up the river. On the opposite bank of the river we viewed huge container crane elevators that lift container boxes onto ships. We saw a stack of orange shipping containers, and even saw one drive by on the bed of a truck. This helped explain how goods are brought from other countries, like toys and food, in big containers and then set onto trains and trucks to carry throughout the country. The Pilot also explained that it's the Coast Guard's job to protect us and to inspect the goods and people that come into our port cities on boats.

Saying goodbye to our pilot, the kids hopped back on the bus to make a short trip to the Great Plaza at Penn's Landing. We ate lunch at the riverside- a challenge with all the hungry seagulls about! There's a very detailed engrave scale model of the Delaware River along the promenade, so after lunch we lined the kids up for a follow-the-leader down the river. Before we started I asked if they remembered in which state was the river's source (New York!), and then as we go down the river what state is on our right (PA!), and on our left (NJ!) and where is the mouth of the river (Atlantic Ocean!). Walking down the river we noted all the tributaries and major cities along the path. We had enough free time to allow for some sketching. I helped one boy do a grid enlargement of the river engraving he wanted to draw so much. I drew out a grid on his page after asking him to count how many tiles there were. Then we looked at each tile and found the lines to match up with the squares on the page. Other students drew the Ben Franklin bridge, and others noted the many birds about.

We took one last stroll down to a Steamboat docked at the landing, then returned to the bus and back to school. There's so much new information to think about! I'm eager to get back into the classroom so we can process these ideas with our art projects and writing. One more Field trip to go on Friday!