Belmonte Middle School DC Trip 2016

Good evening, 

By the time many of you read this, we might already have left the Middle School.  I apologize for that, I typically like to have a test blog out a few days before we travel.  Unfortunately, this year, I have a lot of things on my plate and my good intentions turned into late night procrastination.

My name is Richard Lavoie.  I am a high school teacher at Saugus High School.  I teach American history.  Besides teaching, I am an avid traveler...and on many of my journeys, I have taken students along for the adventure.  I have been to more countries than states and I have been to about 25 states.  I am not saying this to brag, but instead, to give you a sense of who I am and why attending this middle school trip means so much to me.

I grew up in Saugus.  I went to the Oaklandvale for kindergarten, attended the summer program at the Lynnhurst, played town team basketball in the old Veterans' elementary school, and for grades 1-5 I went to the Waybright.  I attended 6th grade at the Belmonte Junior High School and after three years there, I moved on to Saugus High School.  After graduating in 1995, I attended Salem State College.  My goal was to come back and teach history...and here I am.  

This will be my third time on the Belmonte DC trip.  I am as excited now as I was for my first time with the 8th graders.  My previous two trips were amazing.  I think it makes a lot of sense for me to travel with the kids on this trip for a couple of reasons.  First, most of these kids will be roaming the halls of Saugus High School next year.  In me, they will see a friendly face.  Many of them will be sitting in my US History classes.  I try to make connections between what the kids have seen in DC and what we are learning in class.  Another reason is because I teach American history and government.  Because of the way our curriculum is aligned in Saugus, the 8th grade is learning mostly world history.  In DC, I am able to make help the kids relate to learning about these places even though they have learned them in class.  I like to think that they benefit from my being with them.  I know that I benefit.  Three years ago, on my first trip with Belmonte, I made such strong connections with the kids that Ms. Payne (The high school librarian who also attended that year) and I decided to become their class advisors.  Last year, after completing my second trip, I decided to totally revamp my curriculum and redid all of my lessons...all because I got a sense of how intellectually curious those kids were.  I don't know what this class will teach me, but I am grateful for the opportunity to learn from them.

This blog is a means for me to communicate with parents, family, and friends back home.  I started it in the Spring of 2013 when I traveled to Ireland, Wales, and England with 40+ high school students.  It was an experiment, at the time, in seeing how small the world has become.  Now, I love how it brings parents on the trips with us.  I usually get a few comments and emails from people thanking me for keeping them in the loop.  Apparently, kids don't call home as much as they should.  I usually spend some time each night trying to cover all of the days activities.  I will post a few photos in the blog, but I will also be updating a public Facebook album as we go.  The link is below:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10154932496420760.1073741857.639840759&type=1&l=f9824fcc8b

A few other teachers will probably be contributing to the album.  You shouldn't need a Facebook account to access the images, but if that doesn't seem to be true then email me at rlavoie@saugus.k12.ma.us and I will work on fixing the permissions.

For the more tech savvy parents, guardians, grand parents, family, and friends, you can follow me on Twitter and Instagram too. (Instagram is new this year and I am not as good at updating it)

Twitter: @History01906

Instagram: MrlavoieSHS

Before I conclude, I wanted to give you fair warning on some things.  

(Frequent readers already know what I am going to say)

1. I think I am funny and will make jokes in my blog.  I hope you enjoy them.  They typically come in the form of puns.

2. I can get long-winded (obviously, right, remember this is just a test blog).

3. I am a really good speller and my grammar is usually fine, but I am usually typing long past bed times and I ask for your forgiveness in advance.

4. I really like to make the traveling experience a learning one...even for the people at home.  On our European trips, we have a motto.  It is a quote from Mark Twain who wrote "One Must Travel To Learn."  It has helped develop my philosophy on education.

5. I will tweet and post on Facebook when updates are complete.  Please help spread the word by sharing the news with your social media friends.

6. I feed off of comments, suggestions, and kind words.  I also politely respond to criticisms.  

That's it.  I'm done for the night.  I will probably blog from the road a bit tomorrow morning too.  Thanks for your time.

Mr. Lavoie, feverishly trying to remember what he needs to pack and which snacks he should bring on the bus tomorrow.