A kid’s Brooklyn

I’m a teacher and a dad-to-be (!) so I’ve pretty much always got kids on the mind. I just put together a list of activities in Brooklyn that kids will enjoy for part of my “Explore New York” initiative.

New York Aquarium
Brooklyn Children’s Museum
Prospect Park Zoo
The Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Coney Island Boardwalk
Brighton Beach
Deno’s Wonder Wheel Amusement Park
Jewish [...]

New York City Field Trips

The school year has finally begun and with it, curriculum finalizations and field trip bookings. Teaching in New York City should be every teacher’s dream—while one does need to be careful about crowds, the field trip possibilities are truly endless and the entire city becomes an extended classroom.
So for all you teachers out there (or [...]

10 Great Places for Fall Foliage

Fall Foliage trips are a great addition to a business trip or for a quick weeeknd away or even for a longer family vacation. First 10 reasons why it is great -

Weather has cooled off
Crowds are less (if you pick the destination right) – like Long Island Fall Foliage
Apple Cider
Harvest Festivals – like Pennsylvania Fall [...]

Summer exhibits at New York City museums

The best part about being a teacher is the vacation time. And since my wife and I both teach, summer vacation is the time to really relax, spend quality time together, travel, and do all the things in New York City that we’re always meaning to do during the year but don’t get around to…mainly, [...]

Dr. Beach recommends…

I’m SO frustrated! We were just in the Tampa area and were choosing between a few beaches in the area and DIDN’T go to Caladesi Island State Park Beach. And NOW, only now, do I read that Dr. Beach rates Caladesi Island SP as the TOP beach in America!
Caladesi Island is a barrier island north [...]

Free NYC! (Thing to Do and See)

New York is an expensive place to live, but it doesn’t need to be an expensive place to play! There is so much to do in the city for free, so get a piece of paper and start taking notes (or just hit print):
Always free: The National Museum of the American Indian, the New York [...]

Juneteenth – Happy Freedom Day!

I’ve been teaching this whole year based on the theme “Time and Place”, so I seem to live from holiday to holiday. Recently it’s been Earth Day to Cinco De Mayo to Memorial Day, and now Juneteenth. Even though we celebrated Black History Month in February and talking about the history of African Americans then, [...]

It’s the most wonderful time of the year… Earth Day!

I usually start getting my students excited about Earth Day a good month in advance, but since this time that coincided with my honeymoon, I started the Earth Day buzz about 2 months ago, introducing a 2 month unit on the nature of New York City. This is my absolute favorite time to be a [...]

The Zoos of New York

While some might like to argue that New York City is one big zoo, others might prefer the more traditional understanding of the term and head out to some of New York’s spectacular animal homes. As being one of the greatest cities in the world, it should come as no surprise that it’s zoos are [...]