Today was SUPER FUN Friday Fun day! In the kitchen, students made dinosaur eggs using grated ivory soap and a mini plastic dinosaur. What squishy, slimy mess, but there were sure a lot of clean hands!
The kindergarteners also finished sewing their dinosaur stuffies. These turned out adorable! The students sharpened their fine motor skills by sewing a running stitch around their dino. I am thankful for the extra parent volunteers who helped out today. Sewing with five year olds is so much easier when there is one adult per child!
My activity today was making dinosaur Shrinky Dinks! Of course I had to share Shrink Dink stories from my childhood with the students. I LOVED shrinky dinks!
These sure did shrink!
Students also played a coding game with Bee Bots. I will do a blog post on Bee Bots soon!
Mrs. Mc David delivered a very special package to the kindergarten classroom this morning.
Oh my…what could it be?! We sat as a class and I carefully unwrapped the tissue and discovered an envelope and an egg!! What could possibly be inside the egg? First we brainstormed animals that hatch from an egg.
Next, I had students record their guess of what they thought might be in the egg.
Then using information that was provided in the envelope, I gave the students three clues that described what is in the egg….
reptile
plant eater
taller than Mrs. Delwiche
Students were asked to record their thoughts after each clue was given to see if their idea changed. Then we had to sit and wait for the egg to hatch!
We waited and waited and waited….
And then…..
Stella the Stegosaurus hatched!! We recorded this new information on our recording sheets.
Stella the Stegosaurus brought exciting news to our classroom. She is going to be available for sleepovers beginning this weekend! More to come on this soon!
Yes, the dinosaurs have left the building. As of today, the dinosaur unit is officially over.
What a unit it was! From our field trips to art creations to research projects and recipes, the students learned all they ever wanted to know about dinosaurs.
We celebrated these magnificent creatures with a showing of our dinosaur presentations. Here are just two examples of these incredible presentations that the students created.
Of course, students enjoyed herbivore and carnivore-type food. When I went to the food table to clean up, look at one of my little paleontologists did….
So clever!
We will be exploring our oceans next…get ready for a big splash!
Busy days in kindergarten! We had two field trips this past week to further build the students’ learning about dinosaurs. First, we went to the Santa Barbara Natural History Museum, where students participated in a learning lab called Meet the Teeth. They learned about incisors, canines, sharp molars, and flat molars. An added bit of knowledge is the fact that the placements of an animals eyes tells us whether the animal is an herbivore or a carnivore.
All about herbivores, omnivores, and carnivores, students received skulls that they had to categorize by identifying the types of teeth each skull had. But first, students examined their own teeth!
Watch as students explore the skulls and make observations and predictions about the kind of food each animal ate.
Next, students had the opportunity to take their learning into the field. In the Mammal Hall, they were split into pairs and given a skull.
Using this skull, students had to look at the teeth and eye sockets and match the skull to one of the animals in the room. Once each group had completed this, we came together and students presented their findings to the class.
One group was quite perplexed….they knew their animal was a carnivore, but they couldn’t find a mammal on display that matched the size of the skull. Turns out, the skull belonged to a coyote, which was no longer on display. There’s no stumping these kindergartners!
Friday, we had a private tour of the SBCC Earth Science Lab. This field trip has been on hold for the last five years, as the head of the lab retired, and there was no replacement. Fast forward to 2015-2016, and we were invited back! I am just thrilled that students had the chance to see the dinosaur fossils, skulls, eggs, and claws that were on display. They were amazed at the size of these terrible lizards!
This is the femur of a sauropod!
And this is the toe claw of a Velociraptor!
We even had the chance to see a special collection of Woolly Mammoth fossils that were found on Vandenberg Air Force Base back in the 1930’s! The paleontologists at the lab said they continue excavating sites at the Base today!
Next, our lead paleontologist, Eiko, demonstrated how they make molds and casts of the fragile bones.
Next, students explored four stations which included a fossil finding station, a coloring station, an interactive topographic map, and a mineral finding station.
What a fun, fun day! You can have this much fun on Saturday, March 5, when SBCC has their annual giant science fair. All the science labs will be open from 1:00-5:00 on that day so that children can experience many more hands-on, interactive learning exhibits.
Fridays have been filled with fun dinosaur activities! Last week students used muslin fabric and fabric markers to draw a dinosaur. Some students chose to draw the dinosaur that they are studying. This was the first step in creating a dinosaur stuffy. Look how cute these are!
So this week, students finished their stuffies, choosing a coordinating backing fabric, sewing it, and adding stuffing. Adorable!
The children have been busy in the kitchen. Last week they made dinosaur pizzas. You should be proud of how many of your children eat olives and green bell peppers!! This recipe is a fast and easy dinner idea. Even more fun is that it is from a book called, of course, Dinosaur Pizza. Students enjoyed cutting the veggies and sprinkling the cheese.
This week, students became paleontologists, digging up fossils. Armed with goggles and mini excavation tools, students were charged with digging out as many chocolate chips as possible from their cookie.
