Section Section One Number
the idea to build a dinosaur
2 JLP Builds a Dinosaur
The Idea
to Build a Dinosaur Monday, October 29, 2012 Stephanie: Maybe we can collect leaves outside to use for
Theo starts planning to build a dinosaur
“First we have to build the bones, then the skin, then the jaw” -Theo
something later. Theo: Maybe a dinosaur. Stephanie: Out of leaves? Theo: And glue. Stephanie: How do we make a dinosaur out of those things? Theo: Stick the leaves to the glue and then to the dinosaur. Stephanie: What is the dinosaur made of? Theo: Leaves. The whole thing is made of leaves. Stephanie: Ohh. I’m thinking about the skeleton and how it is hard to hold up the dinosaur. Theo: Rocks. We can use rocks. Stephanie: We also have the materials we’ve been collecting. What did your mom bring? Theo: Tubes! Or maybe Magna:Tiles. Stephanie: What is the skeleton made of? A real skeleton, I mean. Theo: Bones…But we already have bones. Remember the fossils. Stephanie: Would those be big enough? Theo starts thinking about the structure he would like to build and we ask the rest of the group to join our discussion. Will they have different ideas? Hazel: We have toilet paper tubes. We could make them into bones. Stephanie: Would you connect them? Hazel: Yes, with glue. Cillian: Maybe with markers? Like, glue markers to it. (Cillian
Cillian and Kitty demonstrating some ideas for bones
brings a colored pencil over to show how he would connect it to the tubes Kitty is holding.) Hazel: We could use the pencil to draw what our dinosaur would look like. Then write ideas about what kind of dinosaur it would be. Stephanie: Like the books we’ve been looking at? Hazel: Yes! Cillian holds the pencil out from the tube to look like an arm.
The Idea to Build a Dinosaur
Stephanie: But how can we connect it all together? Max: Tape! We can do it with tape. Theo: This could be good for the tooth. (He brings over a pyramid
structure made of Magna:Tiles.) Kitty: How many did you use? Theo: One, two, three, four. Four. Hazel: We could use sticks for the straight teeth. Stephanie: So pointy teeth and straight teeth? I guess it depends on what kind of dinosaur we want to make. Hazel: T-Rex! Maya: Yes. T-Rex. There’s one! (She walks over to get the book with the skeleton T-Rex on the cover and brings it over to the group.) Hazel: (looking at the book) They have triangle teeth. Ethan: T-Rex has a short tail. Stephanie: So we’d have to make a tail too? Hazel: We could make it out of sticks and tubes. Cillian: And string. Ethan: Here’s one! (He finds a picture in another book.) Maya: They eat with teeth. Theo: Maybe this could be the tail. (Theo picks up one of the very long tubes from fabric. He draws a mark with a pencil right on the tube.) This is where we cut for the tail. Hazel and Lily come over to help tape a paper towel tube to the end of the fabric tube. The three of them work together for several minutes, using many pieces of clear tape. The smaller tube is attached, however it moves. Do they want it to be more secure?
Theo drawing the cut mark for a tail
Lily and Hazel experiementing with potential arms
Hazel: We need glue. YaEl: What are we going to do for the eyes and nose and ears? Stephanie: We might have to have another meeting just for that.
Would you like to be in charge of that? YaEl: Yeah. Theo: I need help measuring. Brittany: Maybe we can start by drawing, like Hazel said.
Walter is the first over to the drawing table. Hazel, Annika, Iris, Mason, Maya, YaEl, and Cillian draw at the larger table. They look at toys to help. Theo makes a space for himself on the floor and continues marking the fabric tube, looking intently at the book of skeleton pictures. Ethan plays with the toy dinosaurs nearby.
YaEl, Iris, and mason drawing dinosaurs
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4 JLP Builds a Dinosaur Walter: I’m done. It’s a Tyrana:Rex. Mason: I’m working on the dinosaur blood. Hazel: I’m working on the body. Stephanie: What are the lines on your drawing? Hazel: Part of the body. They’re the bones. Max: I’m drawing a dinosaur like you, Hazel! Stephanie: If you could be in charge of one big part of the
Walter working on his T-Rex drawing
dinosaur, which would it be? Hazel: I want to be in charge of the bones. Mason: I want to be in charge of the blood. Kitty: What is that you made, Theo? Theo: (Theo has taped multiple sheets of plain white paper end to end. He asked Hazel to lay down on top of it.) A measuring thing. We’re measuring persons compared to the dinosaur… Is anyone done drawing!? Stephanie: Walter is done. Most of the children are beginning to head outside. Theo: I need to have a meeting with all the 4 and 5 year olds.
Theo measuring Hazel to compare the lenth of people to dinosaurs
Theo working on his measurements
In the basement. Hazel: Can we just do it here? Theo: Where’s Cillian? We need him. Stephanie: Maybe you can tell me your ideas and I’ll write them down so you don’t forget. Then we can have a meeting tomorrow downstairs. Maybe they will feel more ready then? Theo: Okay. Hazel and Lily: Yeah! Tomorrow we’ll be excited. Theo: Let me take a picture of this page.
Theo takes a picture of the T-Rex skeleton. He stays inside as the rest of the kids go outside. He talks a bit more about measuring. While playing outside, Ethan finds two long, thin, green sticks. Hazel sees this and suggests we use those as legs for the dinosaur. Later on, Theo and Hazel are in the kitchen when the idea of building the dinosaurs pops up again. Theo requested to keep the egg carton from lunch. He wants to use the inside dividers as teeth. Theo: First we have to build the bones, then the skin, then
the jaw. Hazel: Don’t forget the blood and the heart and the muscles.
First Building Meeting
FirstEvent Building Title Meeting Tuesday, November Date 06, 2012
Theo, Adi Rose, Harper, Sammy, and Juliet gathered in the basement to discuss building a dinosaur. Theo called this the “Second Tube Meeting.” To begin, Brittany read the words from the first meeting that happened a week ago. As she mentioned “tubes” and “egg cartons,” the children began looking at the materials on the carpet. Stephanie: Think about all the things Brittany just read. What
did it make you think about? Harper: The dinosaur’s heart. We could trace a heart and color it red and put it on the dinosaur. Theo: The teeth. Stephanie: What about the teeth? Theo: How big they are. (He holds up his hands to show us how big.) Harper: Big. Brittany: Theo had the idea of egg cartons. Sammy: We could cut off the bottom and glue ‘em on to use as teeth. Theo: No. (He firsts opens one carton and places the other inside. Then he closes both of them and holds them up, bottom to bottom.) Juliet: We could use these. (She opens one and points to the cone shaped dividers.) Because they’re sharp. Sammy: But not really sharp. Theo: Good idea. Brittany: What was your idea, Adi Rose? Adi Rose: We could draw a circle and color it red and see if it looks like blood. Brittany: I’ve heard you mention the heart, blood, and teeth. What is the first part of the dinosaur we would build? Theo: Legs and feet. Adi Rose: Feet first, then legs. Theo: That big tube as the foot. (He points out the long fabric tube.) Adi Rose: (She holds up a short toilet paper tube.) We could use these as the legs…but the long one. (She finds the medium paper towel tube). Sammy: And those little ones for the foot.
Theo showing how big the teeth should be
Juliet’s idea for teeth
Adi Rose’s idea for legs
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6 JLP Builds a Dinosaur
Theo: No, these are the toes. Brittany: Theo, you’re saying this (long one) would be the leg?
Adi Rose, Juliet, Sammy, and Harper finding the middle of the big fabric tube
(She stands up the long tube.) It almost touches the ceiling. What’s on top of the legs? Sammy: The head. Adi Rose: No, the body! Harper: It’s too tall. But we could cut this in half and then it would be two legs. Brittany: Cut it in the middle? Harper: Yes. But how do we know where the middle is? Sammy: It’s right there I think. Where that line is (he points to a crease where the tube was bent.) Theo returns from a quick run upstairs with the book he was looking at last time. Stephanie: Harper suggested that we cut the long tube to make
Harper and Theo figuring out how many legs there should be
two legs because it looked too tall. Theo: Okay, that’s a good idea. Adi Rose: Wait. The only thing we’re working on is how many legs there are. Sammy: Four. Adi Rose: Yeah, four. Theo: No, two. Harper: (She looks at the T-Rex skeleton in the book) The other two are arms. Short arms. Adi Rose: And two really long legs. Not that long, though. Brittany: Is the leg one long bone? They all examine the picture of the T-Rex skelton. Theo: No, it’s three bones. Harper: (points to each leg and counts the foot and the two other
Harper counting the bones that make up the dinosaur legs
bones she sees) One, two, three…and four, five, six. Maybe we should split up into groups and look at different books. Theo: What about the eyes? Stephanie: Does the skeleton have eyes? Theo: They would be here (points to the holes in the skeleton head). Stephanie: Are we just going to make the skeleton? Adi Rose: No. After comes skin. Juliet: Paper skin. Adi Rose: Yeah, it’s that color (points to the small picture in the book).
First Building Meeting
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Harper: It’s brown and black and white. Stephanie: Hmm, okay. What is step one for building our
dinosaur? Adi Rose: Bones.
Theo has been fiddling with and rearranging the egg cartons and short tubes. He pauses with one carton upside down with two tubes over the end cups. He places the second carton right side up so it aligns with the bottom one and connects it to the tops of the same tubes. He moves the unconnected ends apart and together, much like a jaw. Theo: These can be the teeth. Adi Rose: (Looks over at Theo and points) Mouth! Juliet: We need a tongue in the middle. Theo: Paper tongue. Sammy: I know how to cut out a tongue. Stephanie: Are there any other materials we could use? Harper: Fur? A red furry tongue. Adi Rose: But it’s wet. Harper: We could lick the fur and make it wet. Adi Rose: I know! We could color it with all different reds and
then Sammy could cut it out. Stephanie: So far today, we’ve talked a lot about the head and teeth, and the legs and feet. Brittany: Where should we start? With a certain section? Stephanie: Or work on different parts at the same time? Harper: Same time. I want to do the legs group. Adi Rose: Me and Harper could be working on the legs and feet. Theo: I have the head. Brittany: So we have people to do the head (she covers the head in the picture), and the legs (she covers the legs in the picture). What are the other sections? Adi Rose: The tail. Theo: The belly. Sammy: I want to be on the belly cause it’s just lines. Brittany: (She covers the tail and the belly) This is the only part left; the neck area. Would it go with the belly or the head? Theo: The head maybe? It connects them. Stephanie: Maybe those groups would have to work together a bit? Theo: Yeah.
Theo experimenting with egg cartons and tubes until they look like teeth
Adi Rose noticing Theo’s egg carton mouth
“It actually looks like the neck goes all the way down to the tail.” -Adi Rose
8 JLP Builds a Dinosaur Adi Rose: It actually looks like the neck goes all the way down
to the tail. (She traces the long bone.)
Theo: It’s forty feet long. Stephanie: How long would ours be? Theo: Forty feet. Stephanie: Can we see the head you made?
Theo puts it in the middle of the group and Stephanie points to the small picture in the book that shows the scale of the T-Rex to a human. Stephanie: When I look at this picture of the real dinosaur next to
Theo, Juliet, and Sammy looking at the different parts of the dinosaur
“Maybe we should split up into groups and look atdifferent books” -Harper
Theo and Juliet looking at the scale image with Stephanie
that person about the size of me, I can see how big the head is. Does the head that Theo made look that much bigger than me? Sammy: No. Harper: It’s smaller. Stephanie: So, if this is our dinosaur head, will our dinosaur be as big as a real one? Theo: No. Harper: But it can still look real. Theo: We have to measure. Stephanie: Hmm, we know how big our head will be. I wonder how many heads it takes to make a leg. (Stephanie uses her fingers to show how long the dinosaur head is in the picture, then moves her hand over to the legs.) This is how long one head is next to the leg. Is it the same? Harper: No. The leg is longer. Stephanie: So how many? (She does the same measurement with the other hand, and the two of them together are about the same length as the leg. Everyone counts together) One. Two. This is how long one head is, and this is how long two heads next to each other is. It took two heads to make one leg. Adi Rose: (She grabs the long tube Harper first wanted to cut in half.) We could cut it as long as those two egg things. She helps Stephanie Stack two cartons end to end and holds the long tube next to it. She and Harper take turns drawing a line for each leg as long as the two cartons put together. Harper: This is where we’ll cut. Stephanie: So now we know how big our head is and how long
our legs will be? Theo: Yeah. I need two short tubes and two egg cartons.
Committees Meeting
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Committees Meeting
Wednesday, November 14, 2012 Brittany: Last week we had a meeting about building the
dinosaur. We came up with the idea to look at different parts and have groups to help with that part. Theo: Head group, that’s me. Brittany: Yes, and we had the body group. Hazel: That’s me. Brittany: We also a group for the legs and the tail. YaEl: And the eye group. Brittany: Another word for group is committee. Maybe we can vote on which word we want to use. We took a vote to see which word everyone liked. “Committee”
“Group”
Hazel
Milo B.
Lily
Benjamin
Avery
Juliet
Lola
Theo
Harper
YaEl
Theo sharing his inspiration book with Annalise, Yael, Lola, and the rest of the group
“If Hazel is working on the feet, then... me and Adi Rose are the legs.” -Harper
Sammy Mason Maya
Susie: Now we’ll count them all up and see which has more. It
looks like there were eight votes for committee and five votes for group. Hazel: Committee wins! Susie: What kind of committees will we have? Theo: Head committee. Harper: Leg committee. Hazel: Eye committee and body committee. Harper: The tail. Theo: Neck committee. Hazel: Mouth committee. Brittany: Is that the same as the head or different?
Susie announcing the results of the committe vote
10 JLP Builds a Dinosaur Harper: Same! Susie: So we have a committee for the head and eyes, the neck,
The group decides what types of committees they’ll need
“Um, I want to be on all of the parts’ committees.” -Sammy
Sammy and Harper cut out dinosaur shapes
the body, the legs, and the tail. Is that all we need? Hazel: We need arms… and Hands! Harper: Arms and hands together. Hazel: Feet committee. Harper: If Hazel is working on the feet,then…me and Adi Rose are the legs. Hazel: No, I’m with Lily on the body. Theo: I’m the head. Sammy: Um, I want to be on all of the parts’ committees. Susie: You’d like to help with every committee? Is it okay to be on more than one? Sammy: Yes. It’s okay. Susie: YaEl, did you say you wanted to be on the eye committee? YaEl: Yes. Lily: I want to be on the neck. Mason: I want to be on all. Susie: It looks like we’ll have Sammy and Mason doing the tail then. Mason: Yeah, I want to be on the tail with Sammy. Sammy: Can I draw a picture of a dinosaur? Hazel: Me too! Stephanie: Are you going to draw the whole dinosaur or just your part? Hazel: I was going to draw a whole dinosaur. Theo: We forgot the jaw! Stephanie: Would that be part of the head? Theo: No, it’s right here. It’s part of the neck. Stephanie: Okay, we’ll have to look closer at that. Committee
Leaders
Head
Theo
Eyes
Lily
Neck
YaEl
Body
Hazel
Legs, feet, toes
Adi Rose, Harper, Lola
Arms
(Undecided)
Tail
Sammy, Mason
Undecided
Luke, Cillian, Milo H, Iris