Field Trip Day ...

Missouri's homeschool laws dictate that each student must receive 1,000 hours of instruction per year, that 600 of those hours be in five "core subjects" (reading, math, social studies, language arts and science -- the other 400 can be things like fine arts, physical education, etc.), and that 400 of those hours occur at "the regular home school location."

Which means that only 200 hours of field trips per year can count toward "core subject" stuff.

Daniel and Liam got seven hours of (mostly) social studies field trip credit in today, with visits to the Soulard Farmers Market (established in 1779!) and Washington University's 22nd Annual Pow Wow. They also got to spend much of that time with their friends Brandon and Charity, children of our friends Chris and Evonne Bennett (of Springfield, Illinois -- they came down for the day).

I'm not sure how to classify the last two hours, so I'll probably leave it as "social studies." We ended up down at the Delmar Loop where, among other things, both kids watched the Fitz's soda bottling factory (located inside Fitz's restaurant) in operation and visited the Chuck Berry statue, and Daniel purchased an ocarina (an hour of learning to play it so far since we got home with it -- fine arts credit!).

They weren't the only ones doing cool stuff, either. The high point of the day for me came at the market, when I asked a member of a trio of musicians (there's always someone playing at each entrance to the market) if that was a National Steel resonator guitar he was playing. It wasn't. It was a Johnson (an Asian brand based on the National Steel line) ... and he allowed me to sit in with it for a quick rendition of "I'll Fly Away." First time I've played a "Dobro"-type instrument. Very nice! I gotta get me one of those.