First graders contemplated what would happen if the dinosaurs came back for this awesome project. There are a few different versions of this project that I have seen and since my own dinosaur lesson for 1st grade really needed an update I figured I would give it the Ol’ College Go. (What does that even mean anyway? I didn’t try at all in college. So I guess I gave it the ol’ Post-College Go.)

 

 

We began by reading the adorable book If the Dinosaurs Came Back and noticing the contrast of the illustrations.

We sketched dinosaurs from looking at toy dinosaurs, paying careful attention to shapes and details. I was the Tracing Sheriff and arrested the ‘perps who tried to trace. It just turned into a blob, HA! Do your own work, draw those shapes! 

Then, first graders created a background and wrote a sentence about what would happen if the dinosaurs came back. They traced over their lines with sharpie.

The next week, we chose one of our dino sketches to draw B I G on another piece of paper. Students could choose to make their dinosaur be warm or cool colors. They added color by painting water on top of tissue paper. These artists were so amazed to see the colors mix and bleed together! WHAT BLOOD?!?! Not real blood guys . . . c’mon, calm down. 

The last step was to cut out the dino and glue it to the background.  Students tried their very best to put together a comprehensible sentence which described their illustration. This ended up being a lot more challenging than one would think due to spelling and punctuation and capital letters and such but Firsties gave it the Ol’ Post-College Go. For your benefit dear reader I have translated the following works of art from First-Grade-Anese to English. Enjoy!

If the dinosaurs came back they would play with me on the playground. 

If the dinosaurs were alive they would help the city. 

If the dinosaurs came back they will help the circus. 

If the dinosaurs came back people could give them makeup. 

If the dinosaurs came back they could take swimmers on rides at the beach. 

If the dinosaurs came back they would make great ski slopes. 

If the dinosaurs came back they would take children for rides. 

If the dinosaurs came back they could go on a boat. 

If the dinosaurs came back they would be a car. 

 

Other excellent answers included: they could do my laundry, they could cook my food for me, they could do my homework for me, and they could help me win at video games. My own personal answer: If the dinosaurs came back they would wash all the paintbrushes off for me at the end of the day. But since the dinosaurs are in fact not here I will just have to do it myself 🙂