Dinosaur Fossils

We made our own fossils, and you can too!  They're so easy!

All it took was a batch of home-made playdough (no food coloring added or needed).  Each student got their own bit of playdough to play with and push small play dinosaurs into, when they were finished they did one final press of a dinosaur into their playdough then we cut around it and left it out to dry.  They loved taking home thier own 'fossil'.

My playdough recipe:

2 cups flour

1 cup salt

1 tbsp cream of tartar

2 cups boiling water

2 tbsp veg oil

Put 2 cups of water in a container in the microwave and heat until boiling.  In the meantime, mix the flour, salt and cream of tartar in a large bowl.  Once the water is boiling, pour in to the flour mixture along with the veg oil.  Stir until incorporated and then finish incorporating all ingredients with hands.

Dino Excavation

I was trying to think of 'different' fun things to do with Dinosaurs in preschool and thought it would be a fun sensory experience to excavate dinosaurs from ice.

Each student got a small frozen dinosaur, they would then put on safety goggles and with the help of a teacher they hammered the ice until it would crack/break, then they would run it under luke warm water until the ice came off -- and for all of their hard work, they got to keep their dinosaur!  The kids LOVED the activity!

Tie-Dye Paint Project

Even though this is NON-EDIBLE I just had to post it because it's so much fun!!! It's a fun way to paint paper to look like tie-dye!Here's what you need: paper, shaving Cream, water colors (or food coloring), squigiHere's what you do:
Put the shaving cream in a tray (or cookie sheet) and flatten it with your fingers to about an inch thick. Drip different colors of the water colors on the shaving cream and spread around with your fingers (or spoon, or craft stick).
Then lay the paper on the colored shaving cream and rub the back gently with your hands to flatten and make sure the paper is covered with shaving cream.
Then you pull the paper off and squigi the shaving cream off and you have a SUPER COOL tie-dye print!

Creepy Potions

For Halloween this year made these lovely potions for our 'witches lair' in our dramatic play area in preschool. The kids loved pretending to mix up potions, and stir their pretend brew while they were dressed up as witches and bats!

I just bought some of those drink shooters they sell at Target during Christmas and New Years and dumped out the contents. Then I filled each little tube with a lovely concoction and/or bug, eyeball, frog, etc. to make it more creepy!

Here are the concoction mixes:

baby oil and food coloring (they don't mix so it looks super creepy!)

Karo syrup and glitter, bugs, frogs etc (and food coloring to change the color if wanted)

Water and food coloring, glitter, etc.

DON'T FORGET: to glue the lids on nice and tight!!!! These are for pretend only! ;)

FREE Resources!

Have I mentioned how obsessed I am with Lakeshore Learning? Well, I got an e-mail from Andrea at Lakeshore Learning and she wanted me to let you know about Free Resources on their website! There's NOTHING better than FREE! It's a resource center for teachers & parents full of fun free ideas: activities, templates, worksheets, advice, tips and projects (like this this cute flower pot idea below).