Year 2/3AP Say Thank You

Back on the 18th November, one of our team members visited Pebble Brook Primary in Cheshire to undertake a series of dinosaur and fossil themed workshops with three classes.  We challenged Miss Pestell’s class to write to our offices and send us thank you letters.  Could the inspired pupils compose thank you letters after the dinosaur workshop?

We wanted to see lots of careful hand-writing with sentences starting with capital letters and proper use of punctuation.  Sure enough, yesterday afternoon the postman arrived and handed over a big red envelope which when opened, was found to contain lots of lovely letters from the children.

Thank You Letters after a Dinosaur Workshop

What a Lovely Set of Thank You Letters from 2/3AP

Year 2/3AP sent in thank you letters to Everything Dinosaur after our fossil workshop.  Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

To contact Everything Dinosaur team members: Email Team Members at Everything Dinosaur.

Drawings of Dinosaurs

During our dinosaur workshop, we asked the eager, young palaeontologists to imagine designing their very own dinosaur.  The children chose to illustrate their letters to us with some of their dinosaur creations.  Our dinosaur expert wanted to see lots of labelling on the diagrams and the children certainly obliged, well done Year 2/3AP.  Young Alfie even put a drawing of “Dinosaur Mike” next to his dinosaur so that he could show the scale, that’s a really good idea.

Alfie’s Letter Included a Prehistoric Animal Drawing That Used “Dinosaur Mike” for Scale

Alfie’s thank you letter.  Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

A number of the children, including Ashlea, Luke and Adam wanted to know how we find all the fossils?  Well, it takes patience and you have to visit places such as beaches where fossils are being washed out of the cliffs, then you simply explore the beach area picking up and examining any strange shaped objects you might find amongst the stones and gravel.

Questions About Tyrannosaurus rex

Sometimes, we have to dig out dinosaur bones using excavators and shovels, but when we get close to the bone we take great care and use much smaller tools such as fine chisels and brushes to carefully free the fossil from the surrounding rock.   If the children of class 2/3AP found a complete fossil of a Tyrannosaurus rex buried in their playground and they all worked eight hours a day, seven days a week it could take more than three years to excavate the fossilised bones, clean them all and prepare them for display in a museum!

Mia asked how much does a T. rex weigh?  Another good question, we estimate that a fully-grown T. rex would weigh around seven tonnes, that’s heavier than more than 250 Year 2 pupils!  Some children asked how big was a T. rex skull?  Recently, palaeontologists discovered a Tyrannosaurus rex skull in America, when it has been dug out and put together it is likely to measure more than 1.2 metres long.

A Super Thank You Letter Sent in by Anita

A thank you letter to Everything Dinosaur from Anita.  Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Several of the children impressed with their joined-up hand-writing and we really like the spiky dinosaur that Anita drew for us.  To answer your question Anita, T. rex was a meat-eater, whilst Stegosaurus was a plant-eater, can the children in Year 2/3AP remember the word used by scientists to describe a meat-eater C_R_IV_RE?  Can they remember the word used to describe plant-eaters H_RB_V__E?

A Thank You Letter from Ruby

Ruby’s thank you letter.  Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Lots and Lots of Questions

Andrea asked what age our dinosaur expert was when he found his first fossils?  He was eight-years-old, when he found his first fossils on a trip to the seaside.  Lucie and Patricia asked how many fossils have we got?  To be honest Patricia and Lucie, we have never stopped to count them all, we must have a few thousand in total.

Our thanks to Andrei, Ryan, Cyprian and Lois and to the whole of class 2/3AP for their super dinosaur designs.  We enjoyed looking at all the prehistoric animal drawings and we loved reading all the wonderful letters.  A big T. rex roar with delight to all the children in Year 2/3AP and a special thank you from us to Miss Pestell for being such an inspiring teacher.

Visit Everything Dinosaur’s website: Everything Dinosaur.