By Students in Pine Valley’s Extended School Year Program are pictured during their trip to the Comedy Center.
SOUTH DAYTON — As a part of this year’s extended school year program for special education students at Pine Valley Central School, the school has included field trips for students at the end of every week.
The extended school year program is required by New York state for special education students and often occurs over the longer breaks in order to help those who struggle in school not lose what they’ve gained academically throughout the regular school year. This program is also offered by BOCES and Randolph and Forestville students attend the same program as Pine Valley students.
Pine Valley’s Special Education Director, Carrie Davenport, said that the idea to include field trips in the program came after a struggle to manage attendance last year.
“I noticed in our first year doing this program and my first year managing it that attendance was a struggle for many students,” Davenport said. “It is mentally difficult for students who struggle academically to come back to school in the summer. We wanted to find something to help make it easier for them and offer a more hands-on experience for the lessons they learned during the week.”
Davenport said after looking around and doing research into what could be done they decided on fun Friday trips or experiences that tied in every week of the program with what the students learned that week.
Pine Valley students are pictured at the Buffalo Zoo.
The theme for week one, which began in mid-July, was art, so that Friday students took a trip to the Lucille Ball Memorial Park for a painting lesson. The next week they went to the National Comedy Center to connect to the theme of Comedy/TV Field. The third week was zoology and students went to the Buffalo Zoo. Week four’s theme was mining, pulleys and weights and the students’ trip was to the Holiday Valley Sky High Adventure Park. Week five’s trip was to Eden Valley Creamery to learn about cooking and turning milk into cheese and the final trip is set for Aug 16 to Allegany State Park for a picnic after learning about Native Americans, creeks and glaciers.
Davenport said teacher, Jamie Brown, jumped into doing the research and planning of the program and that parents said it was a fantastic idea. The original trip last year was swimming and Davenport said for this year they wanted to do more.
The trips were a collaboration among many people at Pine Valley, including transportation and cafeteria staff. The cafeteria crew is also planning on helping with the picnic for the last upcoming trip.
“It’s cool to see everybody come together for a fun experience instead of just having the normal summer school,” Davenport said.
Davenport gave an example of what students gained from going on the trips, talking about the trip to the Holiday Valley Adventure Park after students spent a week learning about weights, balances, pulleys and rocks. The Adventure Park connected to this theme by looking at the way gravity and momentum works along with breaks to slow down the rides and how the turns also slowed them down. There was also a mining section for younger students who learned about rocks to mine and sort rocks of their own, and everything connected back to the lesson to give the students real life experience.
Students in Pine Valley’s Extended School Year Program are pictured during their trip to the Comedy Center.
Additionally, Davenport said there are multiple reasons why these trips are important to include with the extended school year program, including motivation to attend and behavior, such as wanting to be there and seeing how what students are learning connects to real life.
“Students that struggle the most academically can see how these lessons connect to real life,” Davenport said. “We wanted to bring these lessons to life and make a deeper connection for these students and make it so they are not just short-term lessons that are then forgotten a few weeks later.”
There is a benefit for instructors and others who help put on the trips and overall extended school year program as well, as they get to see the hard work they do be valued and appreciated along with getting breaks of their own, as Davenport added that it can be hard for teachers to come to summer school too. These trips can also invigorate everyone involved and boost teacher creativity, she said.
Every year the school works on growing and expanding the program. Davenport said at the last board meeting that the school had, there was already excitement to give some other ideas for next year’s trips. She said for this year they had hoped to take students to Chautauqua Institution but it did not work out because of the season schedule so that was still on the radar for next year. Davenport said they also want to focus on skills and trades, especially for student interest. She gave an example of a student who was interested in police and fire fighting so they took a trip to Jamestown to visit a Pine Valley alum who was involved in that work.
Davenport credited everyone at the school who helped make the Friday trips a success for this year.
“At Pine Valley we have a team approach,” Davenport said. “Teachers come with ideas to brainstorm and we try to make those happen, especially to the benefit of our students. We always want to say yes, and we start the process with the board and then rely on the teachers and their creativity. We all want to wrap our arms around our students and give them what they need, and this is one example of that.”
