Explain to your students what a fossil is and that scientists study them to learn more about dinosaurs. To help them better understand the concept, make a few of your own. Using clay and a mold shaped like different bones, make an impression and remove it from the mold. Let the clay sit and harden overnight. Bury the fossils in a sandbox or in a designated area outdoors. Let your students pretend to be scientists on an excavation trip looking for fossils. When they find the fossils, have them share what dinosaur the fossil might have come from. Wrap up the lesson by sharing pictures of real dinosaur fossils and pictures of the corresponding dinosaur.
Dinosaurs are characterized by their physical features. Triceratops, for example, has three horns and a Tyrannosaurus Rex has an oversized head with very short arms. Show your students pictures of some different types of dinosaurs and what makes them different. At the end of the lesson, play a game of Pin the Missing Part, a game that follows the same concept of Pin the Tail on the Donkey. Hang a poster on the wall with a picture of a dinosaur body. Make cutouts of different sized heads, arms, horns and tails. Call out the name of a dinosaur and ask a student to finish making the dinosaur with the appropriate features.
Even when looking at pictures, it’s difficult to comprehend just how big dinosaurs truly were. To help children understand their mammoth size, instruct your students that they will make a template of the creatures. At a designated time, escort your students to the school parking lot and mark off the measurements for a particular species. Give your students some sidewalk chalk to create their best free-hand outline within the measured area. Surely, they will be amazed at the size.
Just as children have favorite things to eat, so did the dinosaurs. Explain to your students that some dinosaurs were herbivores, only eating plants, while others were carnivores, or meat eaters. Review some of the species that you’ve learned about so far and now discuss which type of dinosaur it was. This is also a good time to talk about dinosaur teeth and how they played a critical role in their ability to gather and eat food.