Virtual Field Trips

Virtual field trips are becoming more popular, and it's no wonder.

I LOVE field trips.  I believe that a person's education is shaped by all the experiences he or she has over the course of a lifetime. "Doing life" instead of reading about it in a book is so much more memorable.  That's great for places close to home, but unless you are a multi-millionaire, how do you provide great field trips to foreign lands that your children study?

I was thrilled when I first heard about "virtual field trips."  What a great way to see other countries and cultures on a budget.  So, I started searching on the internet for field trips to the places we wanted to go.  Unfortunately, what I found didn't fit with the idea I had about what a virtual field trip should be. 

I found several sites that had trips, but they were laden with objectives, tons of reading, endless rabbit trails of links that were hard to follow, and a few pictures scattered here and there.  Sure they had some good discussion questions and a few project ideas, but other than that I didn't see much difference in what they had to offer over my encyclopedia software.

I wanted video.  For some reason I always equated a virtual field trip with "virtual reality" – an experience involving sight and sound...but not a lot of reading.

That's when I set off to make my kids their own personal "field trip" links to videos on the internet that showed different aspects of countries from the geography and landscape to culture and music.

What I found was that after viewing a few minutes of video, they were excited to research and learn more about the country and culture through books.  It helped to "pique" their interest so to speak.

The popularity of YouTube and other video sharing sites has given the public an enormous database of resources to pull from when searching for information.  Unfortunately, not all of it is worthwhile or appropriate for kids virtual field trips, so how do you pick and choose?

I have spent countless hours scouring the internet for free, educational, good quality videos that can enhance your child's study of a country or region.  I have compiled these into a list complete with running time, summary, and any other necessary information.

These virtual field trips are a great supplement to Sonlight Core 5!

The downloadable e-book format is a great feature.  This will allow you to click on the links directly in the book instead of typing in all the web addresses manually from printed copy.

The best part about the virtual field trips, is right now they are all free! Yes, that's right, FREE! All I ask it that you continue to visit Homeschool-By-Design, share the link with your friends, and visit our shopping page if you ever shop online.

Other trips will be listed here as they become available. If you'd like to see a virtual field trip not listed here, request it by using the contact form and I will do my best to get that country "bumped up" on my list. Make sure you sign up for my RSS feed for instant notification or my free e-zine if you'd only like a few updates a year! HBD Facebook Fans are automatically informed of new info on the site. Spread the word to your friends!

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