Make a pen and ink drawing of a dinosaur skeleton, or find similar drawings online or in books. Pictures with very simple lines work best for this project. Make copies onto white card stock. Break pieces of spaghetti into various lengths. Glue the spaghetti onto the card stock to represent the bones. Break the pieces as needed to fit the different bones. Offer pasta of assorted shapes, such as small round pastas for the vertebrae or macaroni for the claws.
Boil chicken bones to remove the skin. Soak the bones in a solution of chlorine bleach and water to destroy any bacteria and allow them to dry for several days. Bury the bones in the sandbox or sensory table. Give the children small shovels and brushes to dig up the bones. Show the children how to carefully brush the sand off and pack them in crates with straw as paleontologists do. Measure and weigh the bones to extend the activity.
Save a few prepared chicken bones. Give each child a small ball of clay. Roll the clay out and press the chicken bones into it to make a print. Explain that fossils are not the actual bones, but the impressions left behind. Make a special place in the classroom to store dinosaur projects -- a dinosaur museum.
Provide craft sticks, wire, beads, craft clay, glue and other craft supplies for children to build their own dinosaur or dinosaur skeleton. Bring books and pictures of dinosaurs and show the children various types of dinosaurs. Point out interesting aspects of the dinosaurs bodies that may help the children as they build their dinosaurs. For example, many meat-eating dinosaurs stood on two feet instead of four, but had a long tail to balance them.