Hello everyone! This week we went back in time to the dinosaur age! We began the week by reading the facts the students brought from home! Each student enjoyed coming up in front of the class to share his/her dinosaur fact! Boy, did we learn some cool facts about dinosaurs. On Tuesday, we looked at pictures of a dinosaur habitat and compared it to our habitat. We then sorted pictures of the dinosaur habitat and our habitat. During center time we constructed our class dinosaur habitat out of all kinds of recycled materials including cardboard, tissue, paper towel tubes, tins, cups, and much more! After the habitat was completed we brought in the dinosaurs and enjoyed pretending and playing with our friends! Our arch turned into a volcano and the students became paleontologists with clip boards, backpacks, water bottles and of course, more dinosaurs! The students had a dinosaur sheet on the clipboard and their job was to find the dinosaurs in the classroom! Ms. Ginny brought in her real lava rocks!! We discussed how hot lava cools and gets hard to make lava rocks. (goals-participating as a member of a group, confident behaviors, fine motor, making decisions independently, sorting, voice volume)
On Wednesday we learned plant eaters are herbivores and meat eaters are carnivores. Some dinosaurs are omnivores that eat both plants and meat. The hippos enjoyed learning facts about the stegosaurus from our poster, book and our video. Everyone had fun singing our dinosaur song by Laurie Berkner and pretending to be different dinosaurs during transitions. Our letter of the week was M for moon, mom, mouse. We went over the sound and words that begin with this letter. Next week we will construct it with dinosaur bones (q-tips). We made the stegosaurus out of our handprint and will add a tail, legs, spikes, a face and its habitat next week. In addition, we put boney plates on a stegosaurus using clothespins. We had to put the boney plates on in numerical order. We also put dinosaurs puzzles together by placing the pieces in numerical order. (recognizing numbers, fine motor, sequencing numbers, letter recognition, sensory, following 2 step directions)
The hippos signed in to the question, "Do you want the dinosaurs to come back?" Yes or No. During group time we learned about fossils. Paleontologists dig for fossils! After reading a book, watching a video of paleontologists finding fossils and showing pictures of paleontologists, the students had fun making their own fossils with model magic! The hippos also loved painting with dinosaur feet. In addition, students matched dinosaur skeletons to the correct dinosaur and made fossils (penne noodles) in playdoh! During gym we practiced walking with dinosaur feet, did dinosaur yoga and pretended to be different dinosaurs. (fine and gross motor, answering questions, counting and comparing numbers)
Your child may have mentioned the term "WOW" words. These are words that are for older kids! We talk about what they mean and repeat the word after the teacher. Our "WOW" words this week included: habitat, herbivore, carnivore, omnivore and extinct. We will focus on these words more next week!
Our 2nd steps lesson focused on waiting. Sometimes it is hard to wait for others. We can find things to do when we wait such as counting people or things or singing the alphabet song. We practiced our 4 steps to calming down and then brainstormed the things we could count. (listening, respectful behavior, taking turns to answer questions)
Books We Read
Curious George Dinosaur Discovery
Youtube video- Story Bots Stegosaurus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=633OgEaFbDkCurious George and the DinosaurStegosaurus, The Friendlisest Dinosaur
Fun Dinosaur Facts
Questions to Ask
What does extinct mean?
How big is the brain of a stegosaurus? (little, size of a nut)
What do dinosaurs eat? (plants and meat)
What does a paleontologist study? (dinosaurs)
What does the stegosaurus do with his spikes on his tail? (protects himself from T-Rex)
Is stegosaurus at meat eater or a plant eater? (plant)
