Recap of Dino Week
Sorry for the lack of updates this
week. We are in the process of purchasing a new laptop, since mine
has been almost dead for awhile, and Dan's computer keeps shutting
down when we attempt to use it. Yes, I do have my phone, but until I
cave in and get glasses, it REALLY hurts to see that little screen as
I type. :) So with that being said, I need to wait for the new computer to come in so I can upload pictures. Sorry about that...
Anyhow, Dino week went AMAZING. The
boys had so much fun learning about dinosaurs, and had a blast being
paleontologists in the sand box. Pierce even reminded me that we
needed a brush to gently clean the fossils so we do not damage them.
We ended the week with a field trip to Dinosaur State Park in Rocky
Hill, accompanied by 2 other awesome homeschooled kiddos and their
mom. I had never been to the park before, and I will certainly be
taking the boys back. A lot of stuff is hands-on which is always a
blessing when discussing a toddler and preschooler. They had some
cool hiking trails with lots of tidbits along the way, and the
discovery room was the best. Oh! And I couldn't forget the fossils,
tracks, or dinosaur replicas that were all throughout the building
either.
In regards to school activities for the
week, we did a lot of the standard usual stuff. The boys worked on
matching dinosaurs, putting together the heads and tails of
dinosaurs, puzzles, pre-writing worksheets, and a TON of sensory
play. However, their inside sensory table I created did not get as
much use as I thought it would. They had way more fun burying the
big fossils in the sand where it was more plain jane. What did make
the list of repeat activities had to do with letters and making Dino
eggs.
I had found some eggs online with
letters printed on them. They were originally printed off for
Easter, but why can't dino eggs have pastel colors and cool patterns?
On a whim, I decided to take 6 of the letters at a time, and have
Pierce's dinosaur “eat” the letter I called out. (He was playing
with a tyrannosaurs at the time). He LOVED it! He also loved that I
had him tell me what letter to land on. Not only did it reinforce
his knowledge of letters, it also challenged him since the letters
were all lower case. Carter briefly looked at it, but he was more
concerned with playing outside. And I couldn't blame him. It was
close to 85 degrees out.
The second activity that was a huge hit
was making our own dinosaur eggs. If you look up how to make
treasure rocks online, you will end up with a ton of search results.
I had found this activity a long time ago and had only written down
the ingredients I would need, so unfortunately I cannot give the
proper credit to my source. Essentially it was a combination of
flour, salt, coffee, sand, and water that we molded around miniature
dinosaurs. They did not look like eggs, but the boys did not care.
They had fun mixing, measuring, and then playing. I planned on
leaving them out to dry, but with the moisture in the air, I ended up
having to put them in the oven the next morning. The boys were so
excited to hatch their eggs, and I was pretty excited too. It was a
great fine motor activity, which I did not plan on. It was really
tough to break apart the dough! The smiles on their faces once they
finally got the eggs opened, and the little dinosaurs out was
awesome. They loved trying to figure out what type of dinosaur
hatched, and then they started role playing with mommy dinosaurs.
I certainly do not feel like I covered
everything I wanted to in regards to teaching about dinosaurs.
However, it is time to move onto fall BEFORE all of our leaves fall.
What I will do is reintroduce the topic again in the spring. I
already asked the boys if they wanted to do dinosaurs again, and they
both answered YES. That is the beauty of homeschooling; the
flexibility of being able to venture back to what your children want
to learn about. Do you have any favorite dinosaur activities?
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