This activity provides pre-school age children with a basic understanding of the differences between living organisms and why certain animals evolve in certain ways. Give your pre-school class a sheet with the silhouettes of different dinosaurs on it and then ask the class to identify each one. As the children are very young, stick to the silhouettes of well-known and fundamentally different dinosaurs, such as triceratops, stegosaurus and brontosaurus. Ask the children to say what features they used to identify each dinosaur.
Ask the children to choose their favorite dinosaur then ask them to draw a habitat for this dinosaur to live in. Remind the children that the ideal habitat will give the dinosaur food to eat, water to drink and somewhere to shelter from predators and the elements. This activity gives pre-school children an understanding of ecosystems and animal habitats. The activity can be extended by having the children build an environment out of clay, rocks, twigs and other materials then populating this environment with plastic toy dinosaurs.
Cathy W. from preschoolrainbow.org recommends a dinosaur puppet show to teach young children about dinosaurs. You must first record a narration on a cassette tape, which can be played while you act out your puppet show with simple felt dinosaur puppets. The children will enjoy helping you making the felt puppets. Cathy advises introducing various dinosaur theories and concepts using this method, such as their extinction via a meteorite hitting the earth or the evolution of dinosaurs that made them adept at certain tasks.
This activity requires prior preparation. Before the pre-school class arrives, use large toy dinosaurs to make footprint impressions in wet sand contained in plastic cups. Make Plaster of Paris casts of these prints then remove the plastic cup. Bury the casts in a sandbox and, when the children arrive, announce to them that they are going to be taking part in a dinosaur dig. Give them brushes and other implements and let them get to work finding the prints in the sand. This gives them an introduction to the concept of archaeology.