Swamp

Today we made a swamp for our dinosaurs.  I used 2 packs of 'Gelli Baff' in the paddling pool to make it gooey.  It was very effective and a great sensory experience. I didn't mix in in properly (on purpose) which left some areas very gooey and others still watery.  We listened to 'The Prehistoric Dinosaur Brigade' and I tried to encourage stomping!

James predictably went for the greenery I put around the edges.....

.....someone else got back from school and got straight in....



....and then I spent AGES clearing up!!

Dinosaur Play Mat

Yes, another dinosaur thing! I've been making this play mat which I saw here whilst searching for dinosaur activities.  I decided to embroider mine (a bit!) and have cut out some felt dinosaurs to use with it instead of toys.  I think the dinosaurs could be nicer with a bit of stitching too but if I didn't get on with it we would have finished learning about dinosaurs before it was ready! We plan to use it as a prop for a counting rhyme - something about '5 Scary Dinosaurs....' I expect.  I've backed it with some board we had left over from our radiator covers so it could be put on the wall.

More Dinosaur Stuff - Banner, Foam Model and taking them out for a walk.

My laminator is my best friend. Paper does not always lead to happy activities in our house as one child likes to eat it and the other likes to rip it up!  For this banner I cut the dinosaurs out of coloured paper and wrote a letter on each one (spelling dinosaur) and laminated most of them first.  I left three for colouring and once done, I laminated those too! We decorated the others with coloured sticky dots and pegs for spikes.  I got the clothes peg idea from No Time For Flash Cards.

James then threaded them all onto a length of wool, ready to be hung up.

Without stating the obvious too much here, we were able to cover a lot of things with this activity - colours, counting (pegs and dinosaurs), bit of literacy, fine motor skills, mark making and creative stuff - it worked well for us.

Also this week we found some great dinosaur stuff in The Works clearance sale - a puppet which Charlie is very taken with and is helping us with our songs, a jelly mould (I am collecting far to many of these!) and a foam model which I decided to give a try as it was half price. I did the model with James as he is quite good at getting the concept of putting things 'on' and he did really well with it.  We've had some window coverings put up recently so we have been able to put the model on James' windowsill for him to see. This is great, as usually we have to put anything that can be damaged or sabotaged out of sight. 

We took our dinosaurs for a walk on the beach this week too!  They made some lovely footprints in the sand....

.....I keep wondering if anyone found them?!

Dinosaur Song

We have been using this video, found on YouTube by Andy, to add a bit of music to our dinosaur work.

We've been putting it on the iPad to watch which has worked well. 

Then I spotted this toy and thought we could make it a whole lot more interactive!  It makes a big ROAR when you pull the trigger!

So yesterday we put the video on the big PC, got the drums out and we sang along, with the boys taking it in turns to play the drums and add in the ROAR at the end of the chorus!

We also played along, a bit more randomly it has to be said, to this version of 'The Prehistoric Animal Brigade'.

I think we all enjoyed ourselves but James really got into the drumming!

Dinosaur Sensory Box

Sand, dinosaur toys and a bit of greenery from the garden.

James is quite interested in this at the moment. He's been very playful with it, putting his hands and feet in and giggling, waiting for me to 'bury' his feet and help him make prints with both the dinosaurs and himself!

Decopatch Dinosaur

I am totally guilty of underestimating my children! My mum bought them some models to decorate with Decopatch papers and I really didn't think they would manage very long sat doing it, so I decided just to do one dinosaur with them as it tied in with our theme. I planned for them to do one side each, a bit at a time over a few days. 

I was very wrong! Charlie repeatedly singed 'more' to keep going and finished his side all in one go and James was just fantastic doing his side, he even said 'brush' in the end for brushing on the glue, and he sat for about half an hour until he'd finished the lot!