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Home > Features > Learning by Observing
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Learning by Observing
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by Carolyn Schofield Bronston
Robert E. Lee High School
Tyler, Texas
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| | 21 Whirlwind Hours
What are 37 students doing in the school parking lot with their blankets and pillows at 2:45 in the morning? Not camping out for concert tickets or jockeying for Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers tickets. They are about to begin a 21-hour education-packed journey known as the Nineteenth Annual AP Biology Field Trip. Why depart at such an ungodly hour? Our destination of Houston is 200 miles south of Tyler, Texas. Although Dallas is much closer, I know of no other city with such an incredible concentration of fabulous learning opportunities within a 20-block radius -- Houston is tailor-made for a jam-packed day of unforgettable experiences!
With one rest stop along the way (the four-plus hour trip is long, but the kids weather it well and sleep most of the way), we arrive at St. Luke's Hospital in the heart of the Houston Medical Center. First order of business is (what else?) breakfast! A McDonald's housed inside the hospital takes care of all of us in minutes, and as ironic as it seems, having something substantial in your stomach is a big help in preventing queasiness during the surgery viewing. At 8:30 we are escorted upstairs to the two new state-of-the-art surgical suites in the new Heart Institute wing. Each has a large central dome that overlooks the operating table, plus four high-resolution flat screen televisions that allow "close-up and personal" observations. This particular morning, OR1 has a triple bypass/mitral valve replacement/ventricular aneurysm resection just beginning -- the sawing through the sternum is one of the most dramatic moments in any thoracic operation, and we are there! In the adjoining suite, a living donor kidney is being removed by endoscopic procedures (the surgeon's camera view is visible on our TV screens). We are amazed when an hour later the donor kidney is finally detached and pulled out of an extremely small incision in the back. A dear doctor friend who has made these arrangements possible for the last 19 years stays with us to explain all of the procedures and answer hundreds of questions during our two-hour stay.
A heart surgeon who graduated from Tyler High School many years ago always comes up to the viewing to speak with the kids. It is such an honor that these two very busy and important men make time each year in their hectic schedules for kids they do not know but upon whose lives they often have a most profound effect.
After a quick visit to the new Heart Museum (quite a collection of art, memorabilia, photos, computer animations, sculpture, and historical artifacts such as the first artificial heart implanted at St. Luke's -- the kids love it!), we are back on the bus for a 20-block trip to the Houston Zoo, ETA 11 a.m. With 90 minutes to wander the great exhibits (including a superb reptile house, natural gorilla exhibit, aquarium, and viewable veterinary clinic and baby animal nursery) and squeeze in some lunch, my only rule is that everyone stays in groups of three or more for safety.
Back on the bus at 12:45 p.m., we head 10 blocks west to the Museum of Natural History. The staff here has always been terrific to us; we are eagerly greeted and whisked downstairs to the IMAX show just in time for the opening credits. Antarctica is breathtaking -- the aerial photography is magnificent, the underwater photography haunting. A few kids nod off to sleep in the dark, but most jump up at the end of the 45-minute feature ready to investigate the dinosaur fossil dioramas, the extensive shell collection, the unbelievably stunning presentation of gems and minerals, and the "fun with physics" hands-on activities in the basement. The newly installed traveling exhibit is on Nobel Prize
recipients, most serendipitous since my trademark teaching phrase is, "Now, that's a Nobel-Prize-winning question!"
At 2:45, our tickets get us into the Cockrell Butterfly Center, a three-story glass-covered metal spiral that attempts to simulate a tropical rainforest in which hundreds of species of live butterflies flit past as you travel through the foliage. Special windowed enclosures allow us to watch the chrysalises develop and the adult butterflies climb out to dry their wings before being released into the habitat. As we exit, the gigantic and beautifully backlit butterfly collection room is truly awesome.
At 3:30, we are off again for the gross anatomy labs of the University of Texas at Houston Medical School (UT). With five of my former AP Biology students currently studying here, it makes for very personal tours and many different stories about what it takes to go from Robert E. Lee High School to becoming a physician.
This year one of the UT professors actually gives us a beginning medical school lecture before whisking us off to view the cadavers and special teaching organs. With the kids all suited up in aprons and gloves, the "hands-on" experience is amazing.
Sadly, 5:15 comes too quickly. We pass out thank you cards, board the bus for the trip through rush hour traffic to a great Chili's restaurant that knows us so well that our tables are reserved for 6 p.m., and by 7:30 we are on the road home with an ETA well before midnight. Many parents later report being rudely awakened that evening by a frantically chattering teenager who kept them up to the wee hours talking about the amazing things they had seen. For other students, the experience was more personal and private, starting them down a career path that they might otherwise never have discovered. All agree it is one of the best experiences of their high school career, and that makes all the preparation and worry and logistical contortions and lack of sleep worth it!
Carolyn Schofield Bronston has taught at Spring Branch's Memorial High School and Tyler's Robert E. Lee High School in Texas. Traveling as a consultant for the College Board since 1979, she also reads the AP Exam each June, authored the Teacher's Guide -- AP Biology, created the AP Teacher's Corner, and is a member of the AP Biology Development Committee. She is a winner of the Presidential Award for Excellence, the OBTA for Texas, the Tandy Award, the Texas Excellence Award, and a 2003-04 Siemens Award for Advanced Placement.
Next: Tips for Planning Your Own Field Trip
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