Learning Curve

It was a dinosaur-o-rama evening at our house last night.  The Peanut goes through these phases occasionally, where what she wants to watch are shows about a particular topic.  Followed by books on the same subject.

Yesterday, it was dinosaurs.

Watching her absorb information is fascinating.  Kids soak in bits and pieces about topics that interest them like little sponges, and it always amazes me to find out how much of it really sticks, too.

We've started planning vacations around learning experiences for her.  She's bright -- we've known this for a while -- and we've always had a learning component to every trip.  Up 'til now, it's been the usual take along a birding guide or shell book to the beach to identify things we see and find; talk about the physics of rides or the animals in a particular part of a park; see if there are any good museums for an afternoon of fun...that sort of thing.

Our last family trip, though, was specifically designed around visiting Colonial Williamsburg as a sort of test run at historical interest.  And she loved it.  Huzzah.

What I don't want is to be one of those rigid families who only do learning vacations with a set list of goals and no relaxation and fun planned into the mix.  I think that wouldn't be very enjoyable as a kid, and isn't exactly how I want to spend my downtime as an adult, either.  Which is why we also went to Busch Gardens and rode rides and spent time at the hotel pool.

So how do you find the balance?


We're thinking about a trip to DC this summer at some point for a long weekend of Smithsonian-hopping.  Last year, we went to NYC and she and I spent a whole day at the Museum of Natural History while dad was in a seminar.  We could have spent a week exploring it and she still would have been dragging me into the next room to look at something -- her little brain was on fire by the end of the day, despite the exhaustion, and I realized we'd spawned a museum junkie.  Guess the apple really doesn't fall too far in our family.

We try to do some reading before the vacation about where we are going and what sorts of things we should know about the place.  In the case of Williamsburg, we watched the American Girl Felicity movie -- it's set in Williamsburg -- and I picked up a book about colonial times written for kids that was slightly above her range, but still made history a little more accessible.

Honestly, though, it was seeing the town and the people clothed in colonial garb and talking with people there that brought it to life for her and made it fun.

There have to be other learning environments which do this.  The key is to find them.

And after yesterday?  I'm thinking a trip through an area where they are having a dinosaur dig might be a little slice of heaven for her.

What other ideas are there?  Would love to hear what other folks have done.

(Photo of The Peanut on our last trip to Disney World taken by CHS.)