Welcome to Petalosaurus Park

March 5th, 2019

Dear Mom and Dad,

Rawwwrrr! Ooooweeeerrrgghhh! That’s dinosaur speak for “Hello! It’s Tuesday!”

           We’ve been pretty interested in dinosaurs for some time now; it’s something that came up frequently during circle time. Today, W requested if he can have a look inside our cabinets and choose a toy he can play with. He chose our sorting box that had lots of colorful counters. When we opened it, he went first for the dinosaur counters, and X requested the transportation ones.

We started naming the dinosaurs we found: stegosaurus, spinosaurus, brachiosaurus, pterodactyl, and tyrannosaurus. Y asked, “What’s the name of this dinosaur?” while holding up something that had a long and high forehead. Pauline says we always forget the name of this dinosaur as it’s long and difficult to pronounce. Pauline checked on her phone and found that it’s a parasaurolophus. Whew. No wonder we always forget the name.

W requested if he can watch a video of the t– rex. Pauline happily obliged, and she showed them a t– rex looking for food. More friends gathered around them, eager to watch the video. Pauline asked if they wanted to watch a video of a dinosaur that lives in the water. Everyone’s eyes lit up. Pauline then showed a clip of the mosasaur scene from Jurassic World. Our reactions were a mixture of “WOW!” and “WOAH!” Actually, mosasaurs are NOT dinosaurs; they are more closely related to snakes, and a distant relation of the Komodo dragon. There was much pondering about this when Pauline said this. Mosasaur….dinosaur…..but they rhyme…?

Anyway, V asked if we can watch a video of the brachiosaurus. She showed us another clip from the first Jurassic Park movie; it was just beautiful!

“It’s like a giraffosaurus,” V said, giggling.

“Are brachiosaurus bad dinosaurs?” X asked. Pauline said that they just eat plants, not other dinosaurs. Sure enough, the video showed the brachiosaurus eating leaves from the tree.

“Sooooo big!” T mused.

“Oh, look!” W said. She picked a banana counter from the pile of dinosaur counters we had on the carpet. “A banana!” she announced.

“Oh my,” Pauline said. “It must be a bananasaurus,” she said seriously. It took us a second for that to sink in– then we burst out laughing.

“Look! I found a busosaurus!” Z said, picking a bus counter. We all laughed. We continued talking about our favorite dinosaurs (Ryoma said that his favorite was the t– rex, Pauline said hers was the mosasaur even if technically it’s not a dinosaur, and Z was pointing out the Spinosaurus to everybody. W said that she loved the bananasaurus idea and X’s favorite was still the parasaurolophus) until we had to clean up.

Pauline played a “Simon Says” game with us. When she says “Simon says…” we have to follow. If she doesn’t say it, then we don’t have to follow. She tried to do it fast, and it was tricky!

After snacks, we prepared for park, and Pauline chose a book “Edwina The Dinosaur Who Didn’t Know She Was Extinct”, because we have been always interested in dinosaurs. She asked if we knew what the word “extinct” means.

“Extinct means dead.” Y said. That’s right, since dinosaurs are extinct animals, and they have died a long, long, long, long, loooooooooooooong time ago. That’s why we don’t see dinosaurs around today. They’re already gone.

So the story is about Edwina, a dinosaur that is well– loved by the whole town, as she is a nice and friendly dinosaur. There is only one person who doesn't love her, and he is a boy named Reginald. He keeps on saying that dinosaurs are extinct already– so maybe if he makes all the others believe that, then Edwina will be– POOF! Gone. He did everything to convince the people– protests, making his own songs, handing out flyers….. But nothing worked. He talked to Edwina herself as she was the only one willing to listen to him. She was shocked about what he said, but then, in the end, she didn’t care. She was a happy dinosaur, and that’s all that mattered. Reginald realized that he shouldn’t care at all, too, and that he should just be happy. Reginald and Edwina became very good friends in the end.

“Hmm. The cookies are nice,” DD commented when she saw the last page of the book, where Edwina was baking cookies for Reginald, and they are just happy being together.

“They went home and ate cookies!” Y said.

“She didn’t care and just ran away!” VS said.

“The dinosaur just ate ice cream,” XY added.

“Well, you know…..” Pauline began. “There will be times that people will not be nice to you. People will not be nice and respectful all the time with you. Sometimes, they will say mean things that will give your heart an ouchie: ‘You’re not good. You’re not beautiful. You’re not handsome. What you’re doing does not look nice. It’s ugly.’ When that happens, please remember Edwina. You shouldn’t care. You should believe in yourself, that you are good. Just be happy.” she finished. We nodded in agreement. Lesson learned.

We went to the park after. It’s our second time to be in Step Park after it re-opened. We played the dinosaur game first, then Kiki suggested we play “What time is it Mr. Fox?” If the fox says “Dinner time!”, then we make a run for it as Mr. Fox will try to catch us and eat us for dinner.

At first, Kiki was the fox. Then, the more children she catches, they become the foxes, too. We had a fun time running with Sayaka and Pauline. Soon, even Flowers Class who arrived later joined us for the fun. When it was time for us to go, Flowers Class asked why we have to. We hope tomorrow we can play with them again.

What a fun Tuesday, with a beautiful spring weather to match. How about you? How was your day?

Love,

All the Petalosaurus in Petals Class