Dinosaurs, Videos & Organization!

Wow we had a great time at Discover the Dinosaurs yesterday! Tons of realistic looking dinosaurs, many photo ops, plus a lot of educational moments. Then of course there were the "fun" activities to add on top of the experience - inflatables, mini golf, face painting, riding a dinosaur, mining for gems etc. There was even a gift shop set up in the middle! Although the prices were a little steep, it was a lot of fun :) Here are some of the highlights:

 My daughter was hamming it up, she is so me!

 All of the kids loved the excavation tables - I am going to add making one of these tables (mini though!) to our summer to-do list!

 The dinosaurs were hungry!

 "Look kids, your teacher is so old she was around when the dinosaurs were!"

 The kids also panned for precious gems!

This was my favorite part of the day - seeing the intensity in their faces as they sifted through the rocks!

We also got this Dinosaur Egg for my youngest:

It has provided him with hours of amusement. We talked about what would happen if the egg hatched and it was a carnivore like a T. Rex. At first we would feed him hot dogs, but pretty soon he would move on to our pets, the whole family, and eventually the neighbors. Not a good scenario! Then we hoped that it would be an herbivore and Joshua could just spend his days gathering leaves and grass to feed it....until it got too big and trashed our living room! I'm telling you, the story-telling potential of this egg was amazing! We put it in the sink and covered it with water and Joshua gave us a crack by crack update. He could barely sleep last night for excitement. I was a little worried that the dinosaur would not live up to expectations, but when it hatched this morning (assisted by Joshua who just couldn't wait any more!) he was thrilled with the triceratops that came out. So far he has carried it with him all morning and it has been singing and talking and making up all sorts of pretend play scenarios!

Needless to say I am ordering some for our dinosaur unit next year! 

Did I mention that the kids loved their gemstones and have become quite the little rock aficionados? 

They have some rocks that are rough still so we will be buying one of these rock tumblers (which I have always wanted!)

Today we are having a quiet day, the children are organizing and swapping their rocks, Joshua is walking around with his baby dinosaur (who apparently misses his family and is going to go on an adventure to find them!) and my husband is finishing up his bear plaque for his unit commander who is leaving soon:

I think she'll love it when it's all put together!

And so, with everyone effectively occupied, I can play on my computer guilt free!

First up! A linky part at Run! Miss Nelson's Got The Camera!

I've shared a lot of my favorite youtube vids in the past, but I have a couple more that are recent finds:

Not only is this one good for waking up their brains (you cross the midline several times) but it is a great left/right reinforcement!

I wish they had the lower case letter videos too, but this is great for teaching kids to write from the top down!

Hilarious counting song!

Alright, I am off to organize a bit more - I have almost everything inside organized, pretty soon I will have to start bringing in stuff from the garage! I'll leave you with a quick tip for those novelty erasers and pencil boxes! If you check any Dollar Tree or Target Dollar Spot you'll find these great novelty erasers - in many different sizes, shapes and quantities. Snap them up! They are perfect for counting, sorting and patterning. This is one of my "I'm done! What do I do now?" activities. 

When kids are finished early, they can go over and get a math box and then "play" with the erasers - making sets, patterns, counting etc. The bets part is that this activity comes naturally to them - generally I only have to teach them how to use the erasers once and they find the tasks so engaging that I don't see very much off task behavior. The other best part is that at the end of Back-to-School season there are usually tons of pencil boxes that go on clearance! For some reason the stores always order way more boxes than they can sell. This means that the boxes typically go down to 10 cents a piece! Grab up as many as you need to house all of your fun erasers, and while you're there grab the cardboard box that the pencil boxes come in at the store. Now you have an easy way to store the boxes neatly in your classroom!

  

I am off to blog stalk now - have a great Sunday!