Museums, Monuments, and More

I’m finally getting around to blogging about my thoughts on Washington DC. I must say it was a homeschooling paradise. There are so many museums there, which are beautiful and inspiring. We had so much fun during our week-long visit, but we didn’t see half of what I wanted us to see.

One of our first challenges was finding a place to park the RV. It might surprise you to know that some campsites run as much as a hotel, especially when you’re close to a major tourist attraction like DC. However, since I belong to a number of roadschooling groups, I got some great advice and found a regional park in Lorton called Pohick, twenty miles away in Virginia. We’d only planned to be there for five days, but extended to a week to give ourselves time to relax a bit.

The children loved the park’s huge grassy common area that sported a playground. They immediately befriended other kids when we took time off from sightseeing. As a result we met another full-time RVing family! They were headed to Florida, though, so I’m not sure we’ll reconnect soon.

When we stepped foot onto the National Mall on the first day in DC we decided to visit the Air and Space Museum, one I’d remembered from my childhood. It’s still as impressive as it was back then. Plus there was a nice hands-on section for the kids to learn about the physics behind airplanes.

I was eager to explore all the art museums with the children and had a lot of fun at the National Art Museum’s many galleries. It’s amazing how many very famous artists are featured there! We saw Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Monet, Manet, Goya, DaVinci and many more, including a wonderful collection of sculptures.

The museum had recording devices you could borrow, which gave explanations of the works of art. I loved that they had a children’s recording for some of the paintings, which was perfect for Serena and Camille. Cole opted for the grownup discussion and caught details I missed, as he voraciously listened to each word carefully.

In addition to all the museums there were quite a few sculpture gardens to explore. I think those were my favorite. Walking through lovely gardens, viewing amazing bronze sculptures was very relaxing. I can only like to walk around inside for so long, so outdoor walks were a nice change.

The American History Museum was amazing! I’d like to go back there and really explore it more. The exhibits were beautiful and educational, keeping the children entertained on many levels, while teaching them about important facets of our history.

Since Cole is fascinated by the history of various wars, he was entranced with that section of the museum. It was so well laid out! I learned a lot as well, but my favorite part was a small area with a dozen ancient TVs in front of couches from the 60’s. One could sit and view real snippets of history as told by Mike Wallace, Walter Kronkite and many others, including various presidents. It was really a time warp!

If you read Camille’s and Serena’s blogs you’ll notice that they were very intrigued by the Holocaust Museum. I will admit that I wasn’t sure if I should take them, as the subject is so intense, but in the end I realized it was important for them to learn about this horrible blight on our history. This museum had an amazing section for young children, telling the story of a young survivor of the war from his point of view.

We really enjoyed the entire week and look forward to coming back. In order to get into the White House and Pentagon, we will need to contact our Representative and go through a clearance process. I’ll work on that for the future, as I want to return. When we do, I’d like to see more of the art museums and really explore the Natural History Museum, as well as various monuments that we missed the first time around!

Laura Sherman

My husband and I have been married since 1993 and we have three amazing, talented, bright children! I’m known as Laura the friendly ghostwriter and have written almost twenty books and hundreds of articles. Dan and I are so excited to be able to homeschool Cole, Camille, and Serena on the road and wanted to share our experiences with you.