Dinosaur Bones

Dinosaurs are a common interest among young children, but it wasn't until an inquiry in another class that they became a curiosity to a group of Golden Owls. GA, whose older brother is investigating prehistoric times with his entire grade level, is the one who sparked the flame that intrigued others. Children are naturally fascinated by the interests of others and learn through observation of them. It was GA's interest in his brother's learning that allowed him to come into his own class to share his ideas and questions. On the morning of September 21, GA came up to Ms. Leigh to tell her about the dinosaur bones that he has at home. Ms. Leigh was very interested in these bones and asked GA to draw what they looked like. It was at this time that CH and BM became interested in the drawings and joined GA.

After all of the bones and "insides" were drawn, the group decided to cut out the bones and tape them together to form a dinosaur. GA also found it necessary to get some transparency film from the teacher's shelf to put over their drawings so that Ms. Leigh could write down their words without disturbing the bones.

GA had a clear idea what the bones looked like and graciously offered his knowledge to his friend BM, who wasn't quite sure. CH concentrated his drawing on the "insides" of the dinosaur. He carefully designed the dinosaur's stomach, which is made up of pipes. In a constructivist learning environment, the belief is that children are able to construct new knowledge through past and present experiences and interactions. Influential theorists such as John Dewey, Jean Piaget, and Lev Vygotsky are strong believers of children's ability to learn through meaningful, hands-on, and social experiences that are internalized and negotiated to construct beliefs. In this meeting with the dinosaur group, we were able to see how the past knowledge of the children was being tested through the drawings and verbal ideas of others. It is through these types of collaborative projects that the children are able to learn to productively work with others, negotiate ideas, deepen understandings, and construct new ideas about their previous beliefs.

On September 25, GA brought his dinosaur bones from home, which led to an emergency meeting of the dinosaur group. During this meeting, Ms. Leigh decided to sit back and carefully listen to the children's conversation so that the teachers would be able to better understand what the children know about dinosaurs and where their interest in dinosaurs will lead.
CH: "How come GA’s dinosaur bones are broken?"
GA: "Dad cracked it so we can have it. This pokey one is the tooth."
CH: (pointing to his own tooth) "Like this."
GA: (opening his mouth very wide) "Its mouth is this big."

GA: "Dinosaur mouths are bigger; he has more teeth. Like 1001."
CH: "His mouth is as big as our class. He’s bigger than everything. Two dinosaurs reach all the way to space when they stand on the shoulders."
GA: "Dinosaurs are not as big as up to space."
CH: "Kids can carry them up to space."
GA: "No kids can carry a dinosaur. Only giants can carry them."
Ms. Leigh: "What happened to these dinosaurs?"
GA: "The dinosaurs got so old they couldn’t take the oldness anymore, so they died."
CH: "They didn’t eat plants and flies and butterflies cause they wasn’t hungry cause they were sick. Then they all died."
BM: "Dinosaurs cannot go up to the sky. They were so old, they exploded."
CH: "When they exploded, they had grass inside them."
GA: (crossing his arms) "They didn’t explode. My dad told me about it. They got tired of getting old, so they all died."
Just from this conversation, it is easy to see the deep level of the children's interest in dinosaurs. We are looking forward to finding out where our next meetings will take us!

Posted on October 10, 2006 3:07 PM | Permalink