Since returning from Winter break, the children have been diving into learning about dinosaurs. We started with thinking routines to scaffold our investigations. The children shared what they know already and what they wonder about dinosaurs. These posters are hanging in the classroom. The children have been looking at dinosaur books, doing dinosaur puzzles, categorizing dinosaur tracks, and enjoying lots of opportunities to engage in play.

They have been especially excited about fossils. We set up a fossil hunters imaginative play area on the patio with shells, stones, insects in amber, magnifying glasses, and books about fossils and dinosaurs. They made fossil handprints and I wrote down something each child wanted to be remembered by at five. Rebecca shared a news article with us about a nine year old girl who found a Megaladon tooth on a Maryland beach Christmas morning.  We used measuring tape and a yard stick to figure out how big the tooth was and how long the ancient shark would have been.

After sketching a life size T-Rex foot print each child guessed how many of our handprints would fit inside of it. We ended up filling it with forty-five. These calculations and measuring opportunities got the children excited about math and figuring out how to scale things.

In geography and zoology, we are focusing on lakes and islands and the parts of a reptile. The children made paper islands and lakes and covered them with dinosaur stickers. They are making booklets with the parts of a turtle and reading about reptiles. We will continue with different land and water forms each week.