Autumn Field Trips Now Booking at National Colonial Farm

Contact: MaryAlice Bonomo
Phone: 301.283.2113 ext. 28
Email: education@accokeek.org

Area teachers looking for a hands-on encounter with history and nature for their students this autumn can still book a field trip to The Accokeek Foundation's National Colonial Farm at Piscataway Park. At this living history museum, children meet a character from the past (a costumed interpreter) and experience what life was like for an ordinary tobacco planting family in 1775. On any given day, children might help plant seeds, grind corn, card wool or gather wood. And they will get to meet heritage breed animals, including Ossabaw hogs, Hog Island sheep, and Red Devon cattle.

As one fourth-grader wrote in a post-trip reflection, "We learned about Colonial farm life in 1775 with a great experience. We also saw a variety of animals, such as ... Red Devon Cows, and Ossabaw Hogs. We also pretended to be reporters for the Maryland Gazette...It was awesome and fun, and I LOVED it!"

Through these curriculum-based tours, children begin to make important connections between the past and the present, and people's relationship to the land and its resources. In addition to the three colonial tours (Colonial Farm Life, Time-traveling the Seasons of a Colonial Farm, and Eve of the Revolution), teachers may now book the Follow the Food tour. As they visit the Museum Garden, the forest, and the barnyard, children will learn how it was not just people who immigrated to the New World, but plants and animals as well. A suggested donation of $5.00 per student is requested. A donation of $2.00 per child is requested for Title I schools.