Dinosaur ROAR! Lessons

 

My students and I love, love, love this book, especially if you read it with a lot of animation: read slowly on the slow dinosaur page, fast on the fast dinosaur page, pat your belly on the fat page, pretend the spikes hurt your finger on the spiky page etc.

 

We love the book so much, that I created a week's worth of lessons around it.  Of course, you don't have to read the book to enjoy the lessons.  Head over to TeachersPayTeachers or Teacher's Notebook to see a preview or buy the unit.  I also included a freebie from the unit below...

 What kid doesn't love dinosaurs!  Enjoy!

Leaf Counting

From PreKinders:

Leaf Counting

[Math]
I used leaf craft punchers to cut out the pieces from construction paper. Print out the numeral sheets. Have children count out the correct amount of paper cutouts to glue onto the numeral.

• Numeral Sheets: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

Location Word Dice

From Luvin' My Bug:



Words include: on, in, under, beside, behind, in front of

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

From Lightening Bug Literacy:

Play Dough Learning Mats

These are so simple!

From The Imagination Tree

Play Dough Math Mats

These are a must do!  My students (and kids) will love, love, love doing these.

From PreKinders:

Mats include:

Carrots for the Rabbit

Dog Food & Cat Food

Feed the Giraffe

Gingerbread Mats

Christmas Tree 

Snowman

Ten Red Apples Mats

Farm Mats

The Mitten

  This week, I started lesson planning using The Mitten by Jan Brett.  I love lesson planning around books.  The kids enjoy listening to the same story several times and then "reading" the story on their own later.  There are lots and lots of resources online, but I also made a packet for Teacher's Notebook that you can get here.  A few freebies are below:

Skills

Speech and Language

·        Increase vocabulary

·        Retell a familiar story

·        Story map

·        Rhyming words

·        Positional/location terms

·        Answer “who,” “what,” and “where,” and “why” questions

Math

·        Shape naming/matching

·        Big/little sorting

·        Size sequencing

·        Patterning

·        Numeral/sets matching

·        Order numerals/sets in order

·        Matching sets to numerals

Motor

·        Throw balls of yarn into a basket

·        Shaving cream play

·        Crystal painting

·        Mitten lacing

Cooking

·        Mitten Toast

·        Hot Chocolate Mix

Science

·        Touch and tell mittens

 j

Lots of Dino Ideas!

The following activities were found here.


Here are some of the activities you may want to consider in your preschool dinosaur unit (links will follow as detailed activities are added):
Dinosaur Mural (Creative, Social)
Five Silly Dinosaurs  (Music, Math, Language)
Crayon Melting, Dino Style (Creative, Science)
Dinosaur Erosion Table (Sensory, Science)
Fossil Imprints (Science)
Frozen in Time (Sensory, Science)
Preschool Paleontologists  (Science)
Rhyme-A-Saurus(Language, Pre-Reading)
Dinosaur, Dinosaur, What Time is it? (Social, Large Motor)
A Visit to the Museum (Science, Social, Language & Literacy)
Dino Scales (Fine Motor, Creative, Science)
The Classic Volcano (Science)
Hot Lava Hop (Large Motor)
We are the Dinosaurs (Music and Movement, Language)
How Big is a Dino?  (Math)
Dinos Invade the Block Area (Math, Science, Language)
Best Dino Books  (Language)

Games

Musical Spots

1.          Make enough shapes of various colors for each child in the class.  They should be large enough for a child to stand on.

2.          At circle time talk about the shapes and colors with the children.

3.          Give one shape to each child.  Ask the children to place their shapes in a circle on the floor.  This circle should be large enough for the children to walk in a circle without touching the next child.  Ask the children to stand on their shapes.

4.          Explain that this game is played like musical chairs.  When the music starts the children begin to walk outside the circle of shapes.  When the music stops the children will step on the shape that is closest to them.  Only one child may stand on a shape.  There is one less shape than children each time the game is played.

5.          The child who does not have a shape to stand on is asked to sit down and hold the shape that is taken away.

6.          The game continues with a shape being removed each time the music stops.

More – The game can be played with shapes of animals, transportation vehicles or with vinyl placemats.

Sandpaper and Yarn

From: I Can Teach My Child




Use this to make shapes, numbers, or letters.  You can also sort by length or color!

From: Homeschool Creations

The weather is getting cooler, a few leaves are changing color and giving the hint of crisp days to come. Fall is one of my favorite seasons because of so many different things: apple picking, the pumpkin patch, colorful leaves and cool weather. Definitely something we’re looking forward to around here!

 

The Fall Fun Learning Printables includes two separate downloads, one geared toward younger Preschoolers and another for Kindergarten. You’ll find word and letter tracer sheets, early writing strips, find the different object, and beginning sound cards along with a few other fun pieces ~ the Clip & Learn Wheel, fill in the missing number, shadow matching and more.
You can download the Fall Fun Learning Printables here.  Be sure to download both parts of the pack!

Counting, Colors, Weighing

From: Mrs. Kelly's Kindergarten



 

Comparing Numbers

From: Kindergarten Crayons

For comparing numbers to 10 I give kids individual number cards and they build their number with unifix cubes and compare their tower to the partner next to them. They have to say something like "I have 6 cubes and David has 2. My tower is bigger. My number is more." David might say, "My number is less." This builds their academic vocabulary and is great "math talk."

Pumpkin Lapbook

I gathered ideas for this lapbook from several sources.

Use green 12" x 18" construction paper.  Place paper horizontally and fold sides in to meet in the middle.  On the front, you could have your child/student create a pumpkin patch with their fist and orange paint.

Ideas for inside:

Torn art pumpkin (middle)

Pumpkin plant cycle 

Pumpkin patterns (big/little)

Pumpkin song (on the back)

Pumpkin Concentration (in a baggie)

Math Pocketchart Activity

From The Virtual Vine:

  For my students who are working on number concepts to 10, I like to keep up a pocket-chart activity for them to use. Usually the activity coordinates with whatever theme /unit that we're working on . Cut (6) 3x5 index cards in half and program with the numbers 0 - 10. Using the Ellison machine die-cuts, cut out 55 dies.

  Line the numbers up in random order at the left edge of the pocket chart, vertically. Have the students count out the correct number of dies and place them in the row beside the number. An alternate activity would be to place the die-cuts in the rows and have the students count them and place the correct numbers in the pocket chart.