Dramatic Play: Dino Camp

So I told you I'd be back today to show you our Dino Camp. It's pretty fun.

Last year I bought an inflatable Pteranodon from Amazon. This was to replace the Quetzalcoatlus I made several years ago and was pretty much on it's last leg. I wish I still had a picture of it, but basically it was made out of paper and then stuffed with paper so it was 3D. And the wings were huge compared to this little guy. But the Pteranodon is much easier to hang up and to store when not in use. So it was worth it. I also made a Dino Camp sign.

I wanted it to look like it was a banner made from fabric, but it's really poster board. I used stencils for the letters and printed out dinosaurs from a greeting card software I have, then glued them to the sign. I also used the same T-Rex skeleton from our craft today, but printed it out poster-size. So it printed on a bunch of pieces of paper and I had to piece it together and cut it out. I turned our little kitchen around and covered it with paper, then hung up the skeleton. I also put up some other pictures of dinos with their names.

The kids enjoy looking at this and guessing the names of the dinosaurs. During center time, I put out our sand table and fill it with bones. They are actually of a human skeleton that I got around Halloween several years ago. The bones were connected with rope so I just cut them apart. I gave the skull to my nephew and use the rest for dino camp.

The kids use paintbrushes to brush off the sand and carefully remove the bones.

Then they try putting it together into a dinosaur shape. (Without the human skull to give it away, they have no idea they aren't dinosaur bones!)

I also bring in my T-Rex game, which is like Operation.

The kids extract bones from rock with a tweezers. It doesn't work anymore, but it used to roar if you touched the tweezers to the metal. The kids are really having a lot of fun with everything!

And I think the Pteranodon is the perfect touch.

Right next to Dino Camp I have all my library books for the kids to read.

This is a very popular center. You can see that big claw in the picture above. That is one of those "Life Size" books. Awesome. Here is a link to it on Amazon, but I'm sure you can find it at a nearby library.
So, do you think your kids would have fun at my Dino Camp?