27
May

Poppins Book Nook- Dinosaur Fun!

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I am so excited to be a part of the Poppins Book Nook!  This is our first month joining in the fun.  Each month a different theme is picked and then everyone picks a book that relates to the theme and then creates some activities to go along with the book.

Dinosaurs Before Dark

We picked “Dinosaurs Before Dark” by Mary Pope Osborne for our book.  Hailey has just recently started reading chapter books, so she has been really excited that she can read these books on her own.  If you haven’t read this book before- it’s a series about a brother and sister, Jack and Annie.  This is the first book in the series where Jack and Annie discover a tree house.  There are lots of books in the tree house and when Jack is looking at one about dinosaurs he wishes that he could see a real pteranodon.  Suddenly Jack and Annie end up in the days of dinosaurs and of course, an adventure begins.  I love the Magic Tree House series- they are fun, fictional stories but with lots of opportunities for learning about history added in.

We decided to make a dinosaur diorama for our project:

Dinosaur Diorama

A shoebox just wasn’t going to cut it for our plans 🙂 so we used a regular box instead.  Hailey got to work painting her box.

Dinosaur Diorama

She added lots of different props.

Dinosaur Diorama

Some dinosaur eggs

Dinosaur Diorama

A volcano

Dinosaur Diorama

She put a stream and a little pond in, painted some grass on, added some cotton clouds, put some sand and trees in.  And of course, the dinosaurs.

Dinosaur Diorama

Hailey’s completed diorama- she did a great job!

We also made a paper mache dinosaur:

Paper Mache Dinosaur

First the dinosaur was formed using aluminum foil.  There is newspaper stuffed inside his head and body to help keep its shape.

Paper Mache Dinosaur

The dinosaur all covered in paper mache.
For paper mache, we use a 2:1 ratio of water to flour, and I added a little white glue to the mixture too.  It takes a couple of days to be completely dry.

Paper Mache Dinosaur

Once the dinosaur was dry it was time to paint him.  We did a little research about the color of dinosaurs- some scientists believe that dinosaurs were gray, dark green, brown, etc. so that they could blend in with their surroundings.  Other scientists believe that dinosaurs were colorful and even had pretty, bright spots in order to attract a mate.  Hailey decided she agrees with the scientists who think the dinosaurs were colorful, so she painted him purple.

Paper Mache Dinosaur

She added some pink and blue spots.

Paper Mache Dinosaur

The completed paper mache dinosaur.

Dinosaur Diorama

We learned a lot about volcanos too.  I cut out some dinosaur footprints and wrote some volcano related vocabulary words on them (lava, eruption, magma, crust, mantle, outer core, inner core, pumice, tuff, and pahoehoe).  Hailey wrote the definitions on the backs of the footprints.

Dinosaur Diorama

Then she spread them around the living room.  I made some noises and Hailey and Hunter danced around on the footprints.

Dinosaur Diorama

When I stopped making the noise, Hailey read the definition of the word.  The goal, of course, being that once we play it enough she will remember the definitions.

We did a bunch of fun activities all about dinosaurs so it was really hard to pick what to share!  So, here are some of the other activities we did last week too:

Dinosaur Bones Craft

  Hailey made some dinosaur bones.

Dinosaur Fossil Craft

She created a dinosaur fossil.

Volcano Activity

One of her favorite activities was setting off a volcano she made.

Dinosaur Oil Pastel Painting

She made this pretty dinosaur oil pastel painting.

Be sure to like me on Facebook and follow me on Pinterest so you don’t miss any of our fun activities.

Check out some (or all!) of the other bloggers participating in Poppins Book Nook:

Enchanted Homeschooling MomRoyal Baloo3 DinosaursMonsters EdChestnut Grove AcademyGrowing in God’s GraceRoyal Little LambsLife with Moore BabiesTeach Beside MeThe Usual MayhemMum CentralFantastic Fun and LearningKathys Cluttered MindPlay Create ExploreToddler ApprovedGrowing Book by BookAdventures in MommydomB-Inspired MamaThe Fairy and The FrogEdventures with KidsLearning & Growing the Piwi wayA Gluten Free JourneyMom to Crazy Monkeys No Doubt LearningPreschool Powol PacketsTo The Moon and Back Our Craft ~N~ ThingsFarm Fresh AdventuresProverbial Homemaker

If you have your own fun activity to link up, you can that here:


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8 comments on “Poppins Book Nook- Dinosaur Fun!

  1. Momma Jo on said:

    That diorama is fantastic! Great job

  2. Erin - The Usual Mayhem on said:

    My 5 year old is looking through all the posts with me, and he is now begging to make dinosaur footprints and a paper mache dinosaur! (Of course, he wants to make his life-sized and terrifying….yeah, that’ll happen). Your daughter did a fantastic job!

  3. Cathy on said:

    The paper mache dinosaur turned out great!

  4. Andrea @ No Doubt Learning on said:

    What a great idea to put vocabulary on dinosaur footprints and use them for learning. Great idea!

  5. Karyn on said:

    The diorama is awesome! I also love your paper mache dinosaurs. Such fun ideas!

  6. Ashley Moore on said:

    Awesome paper mache! Looks like she had a great time too!

  7. Piwimama on said:

    wow they must be so proud of their amazing creations! they did such a great job!

  8. Pinkoddy on said:

    So many fantastic ideas. I love how you made a papier mâché dinosaur

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