June, 2015 | Everything Dinosaur Blog

22 06, 2015

2,000 “Likes” on Everything Dinosaur’s Facebook Page

By Mike|2023-03-31T18:04:08+01:00June 22nd, 2015|Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page, Press Releases|2 Comments

2,000 “Likes” on Facebook for Everything Dinosaur

Over the last few days or so, the Everything Dinosaur Facebook page has passed the 2,000 “likes” mark. We just want to say a very big thank you to all our customers, readers and dinosaur enthusiasts who have given our page a “like”. Every “like” is greatly appreciated and unlike many companies, we have never purchased “likes” or manipulated the site to add fake likes. All these endorsements have come from people who genuinely think that we are good at what we do.

Two Thousand “Likes” on Everything Dinosaur’s Facebook Page

Two thousand likes on Everything Dinosaur’s Facebook page.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Recently, there have been a number of studies undertaken into how businesses can purchase endorsements such as positive reviews, favourable blog articles, Facebook “likes” and so forth. BBC journalists have even tracked down individuals who have posted up company reviews and been paid for doing so. We at Everything Dinosaur believe that good companies don’t need to mislead customers and potential new customers in this way. We let our good service and hard work speak for us.

2,000 Facebook Likes

To read a recent article about misleading company and product reviews being posted online: Fake Reviews Mislead Customers.

We are truly grateful for all the Facebook “likes” that we receive. We really enjoy posting up pictures, articles and information on our Facebook page, we have lots of friends and last year we accumulated 1,580 “likes” so we are truly honoured to have added nearly five hundred more this year. At Everything Dinosaur we believe that Facebook “likes” have to be earned and not purchased we shall continue to work hard to earn every appreciative “like” that we receive.

At the start of 2015 we set ourselves a few “targets” for Everything Dinosaur’s Facebook page, let’s see how we are doing:

Targets:

Increase “likes” to “2,000” by the end of 2015 (we have reached this target by the third week of June)
Increase the number of friends we have on Facebook to 400 by the end of the year (gaining more Facebook friends all the time and we should pass this target later on this year)
Run at least three competitions and free giveaways to show our gratitude to our Facebook fans (just like we did last year), a new competition will be announced shortly

Target for 2015 was 2,000 earned “likes”.

Feel free to “like” our page by clicking on the Facebook logo – that would be brilliant!!

Perhaps we should reset our Facebook “likes” target for 2015 to 2, 500!

To see the amazing range of prehistoric animal toys and games available from Everything Dinosaur: Prehistoric Animal Themed Toys and Gifts.

21 06, 2015

Dinosaur Day with Year 1

By Mike|2023-03-31T08:19:21+01:00June 21st, 2015|Educational Activities, Main Page, Teaching|0 Comments

Abbey Hey Primary Academy and Dinosaurs

Another busy week with lots of dinosaur workshops with team members travelling to Staffordshire, Derbyshire and Lancashire. There was just enough time to squeeze in a trip to Abbey Hey Primary Academy to meet all the budding young palaeontologists in Year 1 for a special dinosaur day. The children in classes 1Wh, 1G and 1W have been studying dinosaurs and learning all about these amazing prehistoric creatures with the help of their enthusiastic teaching team. Out in the playground our dinosaur expert spotted some wonderful dinosaur shaped chalk boards

Playground Jurassic Park

Fun and creative dinosaur themed playgrounds.

Fun and creative dinosaur themed playground accessories.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Dinosaur Day

With three classes to teach there was no time to lose, so it was straight into the Infants Hall to conduct the first dinosaur workshop with Miss Whitty’s class (1Wh) assisted by Miss Ahmed and Mr Jackson. We were most impressed with the pictures that had been posted up onto Abbey Hey’s school website. Clearly the children enjoyed themselves and they certainly had learned a lot.

Next it was onto class 1G, to visit the children in their classroom and to conduct a second dinosaur and fossil themed session. Our dinosaur expert marvelled at the wonderful examples of dinosaur inspired writing he saw posted up around the classroom. The children had focused on two dinosaurs, the armoured Stegosaurus and the fearsome Tyrannosaurus rex, they had been working out what these dinosaurs were like and compiling a list of dinosaur facts on flip charts.

Stegosaurus and T. rex Inspired Facts

Learning facts about dinosaurs.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Pupils Really Engaged with the Term Topic

Teacher, Miss Ellison explained that the pupils had been really engaged with this term topic and they had loved working out just how big some dinosaurs were. Miss Russell and Miss Farrington took plenty of photographs during the dinosaur workshop, these would help in the planned recall and recount activity that the teaching team had prepared for the afternoon. There was even a model of a big dinosaur egg in the classroom, this topic certainly seems to have captured the imagination of the teachers.

Year 1 Children Have Been Learning About Dinosaur Habitats

Year 1 explore dinosaur habitats.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Dinosaur Habitats

A number of the classes had created their own dinosaur habitats, learning about what animals need to keep them healthy and happy. Good job the children knew how to distinguish the carnivores from the herbivores.

In the afternoon, it was time to work with class 1W. Miss Sarwar (the teacher), had briefed our dinosaur expert on exactly where the children were on the term topic, as a result we were able to help reinforce learning and check understanding as we explored prehistoric animals with the class. Miss Heap and Miss Statham (teaching assistants) were on hand to help the enthusiastic children learn how Triceratops used its horns, how ammonites caught fish and the special, secret powers of armoured dinosaurs.

A spokesperson for the school, commented on the school’s class pages:

Year 1 had a visit from a dinosaur expert [Everything Dinosaur]. They were shown dinosaur fossils dating back over 150 million years. The children thoroughly enjoyed the day and they learnt some much more about dinosaurs.”

To learn more about Everything Dinosaur’s range of inexpensive dinosaur themed toys and gifts: Dinosaur Toys and Gifts.

20 06, 2015

New Study Suggests Sixth Mass Extinction Phase

By Mike|2024-05-05T14:18:40+01:00June 20th, 2015|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal News Stories, Educational Activities, Main Page, Teaching|1 Comment

Our Planet is Entering New Mass Extinction Phase

A team of international scientists based in the United States and Mexico have published a report declaring that a sixth mass extinction event is well under way and our species is running out of time to reverse this trend through conservation efforts. Everything Dinosaur team members have written a number of articles on this blog about reports detailing the current rate of extinctions being recorded and the irreversible loss of ecosystems and biota.

Sixth Mass Extinction

This latest research takes a more conservative approach to calculating species loss than many earlier studies and this study focuses on the impact on vertebrates. Even so, the team conclude that animals with back bones are becoming extinct more than 114 times faster than the “normal”, background extinction rate.

Scientists from Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico, (Mexico), the University of California, Stanford University, Princeton University and the University of Florida state that the Earth is entering the sixth great mass extinction event, some sixty-five million years after the fifth mass extinction which ended the reign of the dinosaurs.

Report States This is the Greatest Extinction Phase Since the Demise of the Dinosaurs

Cataclysmic impact event that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Picture credit: Don Davis commissioned by NASA

Mass Extinctions Recorded in the Fossil Record

The fossil record suggests that there have been five major extinction events in the Phanerozoic Eon which represents the last 545 million years or so of our planet’s history. The term Phanerozoic is derived from the Greek, for “visible life”, this reflects that the preserved fossilised remains of organisms become much more plentiful in rocks dated from 545 million years ago and younger.

Over this huge amount of time, there have always been extinctions. Scientists are aware of the fact that there is a “background” level of extinction, but in this new research, the scientist report that amongst vertebrates the current trends suggest extinction rates 114 times faster than normal.

A Table Showing the Five Previous Mass Extinctions

Table credit: Everything Dinosaur

For model and replicas of prehistoric animals: Dinosaur Models and Prehistoric Animal Figures.

Scientists Comment on the Sixth Mass Extinction Event

Gerrado Ceballos, (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico), lead author of the paper, that has just been published in the academic journal “Science Advances” commented:

“We are now entering the sixth great mass extinction event. If it is allowed to continue, life would take many millions of years to recover and our species itself would likely disappear early on.”

The report concludes that since 1900, more than four hundred species of vertebrates have died out. Such a loss would normally occur over 10,000 years if extinction rates were at the normal, background level.

The rapid loss of biodiversity is put down to the effect of an increasing human population on our planet. The number of humans living on our planet is estimated to have been around 1.9 billion in 1900, today, the human population is estimated to be around 7.325 billion, an increase of 385% over the last one hundred and fifteen years. The expansion of urban populations, pollution, loss of habitats, deforestation and climate change are some of the reasons for the dramatically increasing loss of vertebrates according to the paper’s authors.

Key Vertebrate Species Dying Out

With the disappearance of key vertebrate species from an ecosystem, the other components such as insects and plant life will also be affected. The report states that beneficial insects such as pollinating bees could be lost to humanity within three human generations. The loss of these pollinators would have a huge impact on human food resources and place our own species Homo sapiens very much under threat.

To read an article written in 2014 about potential mass extinctions: Heading for a Sixth Mass Extinction?

The number of global mass extinction events preserved in the fossil record has been challenged recently. Back in April of this year, Everything Dinosaur reported on a new study that suggested that there had been an additional, major extinction event around 260 million years ago in the Permian. This extinction phase preceded the End Permian extinction event that is believed to be the most devastating extinction known from the Phanerozoic. Some 95% of all life is believed to have died out.

To find out more: A Sixth Mass Extinction Event?

19 06, 2015

Genuine Reviews on Everything Dinosaur’s Website

By Mike|2023-03-31T08:06:39+01:00June 19th, 2015|General Teaching|Comments Off on Genuine Reviews on Everything Dinosaur’s Website

Genuine Reviews from Teachers after Dinosaur Workshops

Teachers and their support staff can rest assured when it comes to reading reviews about Everything Dinosaur’s work in schools. Unfortunately, other reviews, comments and feedback posted up on websites about goods and services may not be so trustworthy.

Fake Reviews on Websites

Research undertaken by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has identified a number of highly dubious online practices, many of which may be unlawful. For example, instances of businesses ambushing competitors by placing fake negative reviews on their rival’s website have been identified. The purchase of favourable reviews about a company or its products/services is also occurring.

The CMA states that they are launching an investigation into various organisations, as the use of paid-for endorsements without a clear admission of payment may be unlawful and these attempts to boost brands, products and company profiles could be much more widespread than previously assumed. The BBC has reported on this and even tracked down a student from Bangladesh who openly discussed how much he got paid for posting up fake reviews.

Genuine Reviews About Everything Dinosaur’s Work in Schools

Genuine reviews. Feedback after dinosaur workshop.

Genuine feedback from teachers, teaching assistants and members of the senior leadership team.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Genuine Reviews on Everything Dinosaur’s Websites

The picture above shows a typical feedback form filled in by a teacher after a dinosaur workshop with the class. In this instance, Nikki (the Year 1 teacher), even coloured in the stars to indicate a “5 Star Rating” for our work teaching about dinosaurs and fossils in school. We keep a written record of all the feedback that we receive, these feedback forms and customer comments help us to improve our service to schools and we have them available should any organisation such as STEMNET wish to inspect them.

To read testimonials about Everything Dinosaur from customers: Customer Testimonials.

Sue Judd of Everything Dinosaur commented:

“At Everything Dinosaur, we pride ourselves in publishing genuine feedback, reviews and comments and we would never knowingly post up information such as fake reviews and endorsements.”

Visit Everything Dinosaur’s website: Everything Dinosaur.

To read the reviews about Everything Dinosaur’s work and performance posted up on the independent ratings company Feefo’s website: Everything Dinosaur Feefo Reviews.

19 06, 2015

Woman Killed by Rock Fall at Popular Fossil Hunting Location

By Mike|2023-03-31T08:03:10+01:00June 19th, 2015|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal News Stories, Main Page, Press Releases|0 Comments

Fatal Accident at Llantwit Major (South Wales)

A twenty-four year old woman has been killed after a rock fell on her at Llantwit Major, Vale of Glamorgan (South Wales). The accident happened yesterday evening and emergency services were called to this popular walking and fossil hunting location just before 5.30pm. A spokesperson for the Welsh ambulance service stated that they had received a report of an incident where a rock from the cliffs had fallen on a person’s head.

Unfortunately, the impact proved fatal and the woman was pronounced dead at the scene. The cliffs are extremely dangerous and there are numerous signs posted up along the beach warning visitors of the potential hazards.

Very Dangerous Cliffs along the British Coast

Good idea to go fossil collecting on a falling tide and to keep away from the steep cliffs. There are some very dangerous cliffs along the British coast.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Rock Fall

Each year, the beautiful beaches to be found in this part of south Wales attract thousands of visitors, many of whom are keen to explore the area looking for fossils. There are a lot of different types of fossil to be found, including giant gastropods and numerous bivalves.

Occasionally, vertebrate fossils can be discovered, fish scales and teeth as well as isolated bones from marine reptiles. The blue lias rocks date from the Early Jurassic and they are approximately 200 million years old.

A spokesperson from Everything Dinosaur stated:

“This is very sad news. We will soon be at the height of the holiday season with thousands of tourists flocking to locations such as the Vale of Glamorgan, Ravenscar and the Dorset coast. However, many of the cliffs at these places which are so popular with tourists, are extremely dangerous. Rock falls and land slips are very common around the Lyme Regis and Charmouth areas for example and we urge all visitors to heed the warning signs and to stay away from cliffs.”

Dangerous Cliffs Around Britain’s Coasts

Back in 2012, Everything Dinosaur reported on a fatal accident that took place at Hive Beach (near Bridport, Dorset), this latest terrible incident demonstrates that care and precaution must be taken at all times and visitors to locations such as Llantwit Major are urged to stay clear of the cliffs.

If you are looking for fossils, Everything Dinosaur advises that visitors limit their searches to the rocks along the foreshore and the shales exposed on the beach away from the cliffs. Fossils are being constantly eroded onto the beach and there are always plenty of specimens to find.

The Fossil Collecting Code

Our team members are happy to provide advice and guidance to fossil hunters, in addition, we wrote an article a few years ago now that provided hints and safety tips for fossil hunters.

To read Everything Dinosaur’s tips on safe fossil collecting: Fossil Collecting Code – Safety Tips.

The accident occurred just a few miles to the west of Lavernock Point, it was at Lavernock Point that the fossilised remains of an Early Jurassic meat-eating dinosaur were discovered in 2014. These fossils have just been put on display at the National Museum of Wales. This exceptional fossil find might persuade more people to visit these sites along the Welsh side of the Bristol Channel, whilst fossil hunting can be a wonderful hobby, all the team members at Everything Dinosaur strongly urge that visitors take great care and that they do not approach the cliffs. No fossil collecting should be attempted from the cliffs themselves or any adjacent scree slopes.

19 06, 2015

Papo Velociraptors Claim to Fame with Exciting Film Scenes

By Mike|2024-05-05T14:19:50+01:00June 19th, 2015|Dinosaur Fans, Movie Reviews and Movie News, Photos of Everything Dinosaur Products, Press Releases|0 Comments

“Jurassic World Raptors” and the Papo Velociraptor Replica

Some of the most exciting scenes in the record breaking dinosaur movie “Jurassic World” involve the pack of “raptors” and the various chase scenes. Velociraptors, at least over-sized ones anyway, have been a mainstay of the “Jurassic Park” franchise, ever since the first film came out way back in 1993. Pack hunting and some form of social behaviour has been ascribed to these types of dinosaurs, which as members of the Dromaeosauridae (swift lizards) family, are closely related to modern birds.

Velociraptor

In reality, the two species of Velociraptor described to date were much smaller than their movie counterparts, but even so, they would very probably have been aggressive animals and formidable hunters, much feared by even the largest of the herbivores that shared their Asian habitat towards the end of the Cretaceous.

Which Dinosaur Model Most Closely Resembels the Movie Raptors?

This accolade, we think, goes to Papo for their Velociraptor replica. The theropod dinosaurs in “Jurassic World” have been criticised for not reflecting some of the latest thinking with regards to meat-eating dinosaurs. For example, there is an absence of feathers and many palaeontologists now think that the majority of the Theropoda were at least partially feathered. The Papo Velociraptor dinosaur model is also not feathered.

A Pair of Papo Velociraptors

Papo Velociraptor dinosaur model.

Papo Velociraptor

Papo, the French model and figure manufacturer, has built up a strong reputation for its excellent replicas. The company’s dinosaur model range was believed to have been inspired by the first film, “Jurassic Park” that was released in 1993. The current range consists of over thirty different prehistoric animal models.

To view the full Papo prehistoric animal model range: Papo Dinosaur Models.

In the film, animal trailer turned dinosaur behaviourist Owen Grady, played by Chris Pratt, leads a pack of Velociraptors, describing himself as the “alpha” member of the pack, Owen is able to exercise some degree of control over the actions of his dinosaurs. How much control..? Well, that would be giving away details of the plot and since not all our readers have seen the film yet, we shall say no more.

18 06, 2015

Fake Reviews Misleading Potential Customers but the Helpful Everything Dinosaur Team have the Answers

By Mike|2024-05-05T14:22:13+01:00June 18th, 2015|Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page, Press Releases|0 Comments

Genuine Customer Reviews after Dinosaur Workshops

This week there have been a number of reports commissioned that focus on the allegations over the publishing of fake and misleading reviews on retailing websites. In a survey carried out by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), some 54% of the adults questioned revealed that they relied on reviews that had been posted up on websites and that many respondents found them invaluable.

Third Party Testimonials

Third party testimonials, posted up feedback and customer reviews are a very helpful source of information. Visitors to a website can read the comments and other information posted and this does affect their purchasing decisions.

It is important that customers can feel confident about the information in reviews, that these reviews have been provided by genuine customers, whether it be a service or product purchased. There have also been a number of allegations made of people “blackmailing” businesses with threats to leave very negative reviews in order to obtain a benefit such as a discount.

In addition, many of the reviews that are posted up are often paid for, examples of which are Tweets from innovators and celebrities endorsing a product, or favourable blog articles singing the praises of a company. Some of these blog posts endorsing a firm or its goods and services do state within the article that this is a paid for posting, whilst others do not. The CMA has launched an investigation into several companies, as the use of paid for endorsements without a clear admission of payment may be unlawful.

Genuine Customer Reviews

Everything Dinosaur team members would like to reassure readers that every review posted up on its websites is genuine. The reviews, feedback and comments we receive are from our customers or, as is the case on our dinosaur workshops in school website, from teachers or senior management from an organisation that has had one of our dinosaur themed workshops.

Review Given to Everything Dinosaur from Year 1 Teacher

Every review posted is genuine feedback from a member of the teaching team.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Feedback from a Workshop

Take for example, the image above. This is our latest review, teaching feedback given to us after a dinosaur workshop with a class of Year 1 children. We have removed the teacher’s surname and email address in order to compile with our own online publishing policy in terms of protecting an individual’s privacy. The teacher even took the trouble to colour in the stars as she awarded as “five stars” for our dinosaur workshop.

Nikki (the teacher), stated:

“Fantastic knowledge of dinosaurs, very interactive. Children thoroughly enjoyed it! Great workshop. Thank you.”

Genuine Customer Reviews Received by Everything Dinosaur

Thank you Nikki, your comments are greatly appreciated. We log all our feedback, comments, reviews and such like. Teaching feedback for example, is stored so that we can use this information to help improve our service to schools and to demonstrate to STEM/STEMNET (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths – Network) how we have feedback loops built into our training to help promote continuous development.

Nisha Arora, Senior Director at the CMA, commented to the BBC:

“We are committed to ensuring that consumers’ trust in these important information tools is maintained. We will take enforcement action where necessary to tackle unlawful practices.”

Facebook “Likes”

Facebook “likes” are another area of concern. We know of a number of companies who have purchased thousands of likes to help boost the profile of the Facebook pages and in turn, their own brand/web presence. Facebook, claims to have cracked down on this practice but there are still many examples on this social media platform.

Sue Judd, the Finance Director of Everything Dinosaur stated:

“A huge, international business has sprung up in the last few years all aimed at helping to promote companies, boost brands and endorse products. At Everything Dinosaur, we pride ourselves in publishing genuine feedback, reviews and comments and we would never knowingly post up information such as fake reviews and endorsements.”

Influencing Consumer Spending

The CMA estimates that some £23 billion (GBP) a year of consumer spending was potentially influenced by online reviews. So called “astroturfing”, the practice of creating fake grass root reviews can lead to big rewards for unscrupulous businesses. There have also been reports made about businesses writing fake reviews of themselves to boost their ratings on review sites and even some examples of firms writing or commissioning fake negative reviews to undermine rivals, for malicious reasons or for personal gain.

Purchased Facebook “Likes”

Customers can gain some understanding of the practices employed by examining the business profiles of companies on Facebook. If an organisation suddenly has hundreds or even thousands more “likes”, then this could be an example of purchased likes being added to the business profile. Although, as site managers aim to get on top of this problem, the firms and individuals behind such practices are getting smarter. Rather than post up huge numbers of “likes” in a short period, contracts are drawn up whereby dozens and dozens of fake “likes” are posted up over a period of several weeks. These trends are more difficult for administrators and site security watchdogs to spot.

Everything Dinosaur currently has around 2,020 Facebook “likes”, this number has been steadily rising since the Facebook page was launched.

Everything Dinosaur’s Reviews – The Numbers

Here is a list of the numbers of published reviews from customers posted up on Everything Dinosaur’s websites:

1,286 customer reviews on Everything Dinosaur’s website – Everything Dinosaur. Sadly, we were not able to transfer the many thousands of reviews that had been posted up previously when we transferred website servers.
2,020 Facebook “likes”
57 dinosaur workshop reviews since this site went live at the end of August 2014. To read more about the way in which Everything Dinosaur supports its customers: Everything Dinosaur Testimonials.

Recently, social media sites such as Facebook have introduced a number of enhancements. For instance, visitors to a company’s Facebook page can get an insight into the firm’s responsiveness if the site displays a logo (found under the Page’s cover photo) that states that this firm is very responsive to messages. To qualify a Page must have done both of the following over the previous 7 days:

Responded to 90% of messages
Maintained a median response time of five minutes for all replies sent

These are quite tough, especially when you consider the global nature of a business such as ours. We do our best to respond quickly, but messages sent from Australia could arrive when all our team members are tucked up in bed. Everything Dinosaur confidently predicts that very soon (if not already), a number of dubious practices will be offered by various individuals/companies to provide a false impression of a firm’s responsiveness.

18 06, 2015

Year 1 (Abbey Hey Primary Academy) Study Dinosaurs

By Mike|2023-03-30T22:17:08+01:00June 18th, 2015|General Teaching, Key Stage 1/2|Comments Off on Year 1 (Abbey Hey Primary Academy) Study Dinosaurs

Abbey Hey Primary Academy Children Study Dinosaurs

Children in Year 1 at Abbey Hey Primary Academy have been learning all about prehistoric animals and fossils as part of an exciting summer term topic with a dinosaur theme. The three classes had a visit from one of Everything Dinosaur’s experts this week and a series of dinosaur themed workshops were conducted.

The teachers had created an interesting and varied scheme of work and our dinosaur workshop helped to reinforce learning and check understanding, as well as providing the teaching team with the opportunity to pick the brains of a dinosaur expert so that some new ideas can be incorporated into the term topic.

Dinosaur Habitats

Abbey Hey Children Have Been Learning About Habitats

Lots of tactile handling of different materials. Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Tyrannosaurus rex and Stegosaurus

The children had focused on two dinosaurs, the fearsome Tyrannosaurus rex and the Jurassic herbivore Stegosaurus. They were keen to share their newly acquired knowledge. Lots of pictures of our dinosaur workshops were posted up on the school’s website, a spokesperson for the school stated:

Everything Dinosaur stocks a wide variety of Stegosaurus and Tyrannosaurus rex models and figures. To see the range of dinosaur and prehistoric animal replicas in stock: Dinosaur Models and Prehistoric Animal Figures.

“Today, Year 1 had a visit from Everything Dinosaur. They were shown dinosaur fossils dating back over 150 million years. The children thoroughly enjoyed the day and they learnt so much more about dinosaurs.”

For further information about Everything Dinosaur’s work in schools or to contact us for a quotation: Contact Everything Dinosaur.

17 06, 2015

Thank You for All the Wonderful Dinosaur Pictures

By Mike|2024-05-05T14:20:57+01:00June 17th, 2015|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal Drawings, Dinosaur Fans, Main Page|0 Comments

Lots of Dinosaur Pictures Sent to Everything Dinosaur

Just time to say a very big thank you to all the dinosaur fans and budding fossil collectors that have sent in prehistoric animal pictures. We do look at every single one that we receive and we are humbled when we get so many sent into us. We know that a lot of schools have been teaching dinosaur themed topics during the latter part of the spring term and for the first part of the summer term, as a result, we have been very busy visiting schools and we have seen some wonderful examples of artwork as well as inspiring the next generation of palaeoartists to send in their pictures to Everything Dinosaur.

A Pink Stegosaurus (Very Colourful)

A very colourful pink plant-eating dinosaur.

Picture credit: Enan

Dinosaur Drawings

We have posted up a large number of the illustrations on our warehouse notice boards, others have been put up on the office walls, they certainly cheer the place up. Lots and lots of brightly coloured prehistoric animals such as this very pink Stegosaurus drawn by Enan, aged 4. His mum says that Stegosaurus is his favourite dinosaur (for the moment), but he does tend to change quite frequently and he likes to tell his parents about his dinosaur models and to explain which ones ate plants and which ones ate meat. Well done, Enan.

A spokesperson for the UK-based, mail order company commented:

“Our thanks to Enan and all the other young prehistoric animal fans who sent in dinosaur pictures. Our thanks to the grown-ups as well for giving us permission to post them up and to display them in our offices and warehouse.”

Hopefully, we will have time to post up more examples, on our social media pages and of course on the Everything Dinosaur blog.

Everything Dinosaur stocks a huge range of dinosaur and prehistoric animal themed toys and games including colour-in posters and other creative crafts. To see the range available: Dinosaur Crafts for Kids.

17 06, 2015

Year Six and Dinosaur Blood

By Mike|2023-03-30T22:12:05+01:00June 17th, 2015|Key Stage 1/2|Comments Off on Year Six and Dinosaur Blood

Year Six Study Fossils and Dinosaurs with Everything Dinosaur

Today, Everything Dinosaur visited Newcastle under Lyme School, an independent day school in the heart of Staffordshire. Our mission was to work with the two classes of Year 6 exploring fossils, deep time and to help develop and augment the scheme of work all about palaeontology and geology created by the enthusiastic teaching team.

As part of our work with the dedicated teaching team, we brought a large number of resources with us including replicas of iconic fossil animals such as ammonites and belemnites.

To view the range of replicas of fossil animals in stock at Everything Dinosaur: Replica Fossil Animals and Prehistoric Animal Toys.

Based in one of the classrooms, our dinosaur expert marvelled at the wonderful illustrations of fossils that the children had created as part of a display. He explained the importance of putting a scale on the drawings and after a tactile fossil handling session he set the children an exercise that involved studying some bizarre fish remains. Good job the classes had a scale on their worksheets to help them work out how big the fossils were.

Year Six Children Learn About Palaeontology and Geology

A colourful dinosaur themed display. Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Students Study Dinosaurs

To conclude the dinosaur and fossil themed workshops, Everything Dinosaur shared with the class some information on research conducted by scientists at the Imperial College London. Evidence of organic remains even potential dinosaur blood may have been discovered. This enabled the dinosaur workshop leader to engage the children in a short debate over the perils of trying to bring back extinct creatures. This chimed very nicely with the children as many of them had recently seen the movie “Jurassic World”.

Dinosaur Blood – Evidence of Potential Red Blood Cells Discovered in Dinosaur Fossils

Evidence of potential red blood cells preserved in 75 million year old dinosaur bone.

Picture credit: Laurent Mekul

To learn more about Everything Dinosaur’s work with Upper Key Stage 2 children and to request further information about the dinosaur and prehistoric animal themed toys and games we supply: Contact Everything Dinosaur.