Dinosaurs Rock Week

You can access my Bitmoji Library and Makerspace Resources here in my Dino Wakelet Collection : ​https://wke.lt/w/s/zZWlod

Weeks 3-4: Dinosaurs Rock! Week Lessons & Resources (I used and modified this for all grades K-5. I have a wacky A/B schedule where I see them all for 45 minutes face-to-face twice one week, and then I see them same time only once a week on the second week. I change things up for K and 5th. I do more movement for Kinder, and more higher level projects with 5th.)

Hi, there Parents & Teacher Friends --
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We just finished up two weeks of "Dinosaurs Rock!" in the Libratory. A fun time was had by one and all! I put together the Dino Library on a whim, so teachers, you might want to replace some of those links with your own publisher-approved read alouds, or insert your own. I did a few book talks instead of actual read alouds for the chapter books I put on the shelf. I did this for my 4th/5th graders. My “must-do” read alouds were both of the Dino books by Ryan Higgins and How to Catch a Dinosaur by Adam Wallace. I pre-record my read alouds so they can see them on the screen since we’re so spread out in the space. They color a dino sheet while they watch -- if they would like. Everything else was up to them to read on their own at their leisure.

As far as STEM/STEAM/Makerspace work: I got the STEAM Room template from Casey Verdugo at First Grade Creative so you can copy it and give her credit, and I changed it up to suit my Dinosaur-themed needs.  I also had them do a Dino Makerspace hands-on project -- They made Dino Traps. Kinder out of Marshmallow and Straws, 1-2nd out of Lego, and 3-5th out of recycled materials. They did it as a partner build. It was my first hands-on projects of the year. I was nervous, but it worked out just fine. I threw all the recycled material projects away that they didn’t take home, I sterilized legos and sent marshmallow projects in brown bags with kinders. They wash hands before and after builds, which is our district’s expectation about sharing manipulatives. Not too rigorous here, but then again, our cases in Grand Junction, CO are pretty low.

Learning Targets/Skills: I taught SEL about Facing Our Fears. (You can see the video clips I used on the digital white board) I also implemented a new Call Out/Call Back that went like this; “When I say Dino, you say RAWR! Dino -- RAWR! Dino--RAWR!” And they would stand up and roar and strangely, loved it. It was fun to randomly shout it out and watch them get up and roar on cue. It got them moving and kept them on their toes. And was a good relationship builder for us as a community. As far as Library skills, I taught them how to access ebooks from our local library using our LMS. I talk about that on a couple of the dino chapter book talk links made on the digital book shelf. I also continued to let them finish making their Pixton EDU avatars as a “Makerspace” project with the Dino background pack .. or explore the Dino STEAM Lab activity slide links. They loved the digital STEAM lab -- particularly the T-Rex “Roar” maker and the paper airplane video …  of all things! LOL. I’m moving on to Dots, Robots & Hispanic Heritage the next couple of weeks. Will try to post the dot stuff tomorrow here in our group. Feel free to reach out if you have any questions. As always, you can follow my work at www.newemersonlibratory.org and I have a few  Dino color sheets/resources on my Wakelet Collection: https://wke.lt/w/s/zZWlod - Take care! -- Miranda :)