Guest Post by Ness from One Perfect Day Blog
We recently spent an afternoon painting some rocks in fun bright patterns. The rocks have been a big hit with my 4 year old son, R. We’ve used them for all sorts of games including a fun garden treasure hunt. The collection of rocks you see in the photo above reminded me of dinosaur eggs so I decided to create a dinosaur imaginative play scene. We’ve created dinosaur worlds before, but this time I added to the activity by burying our “dinosaur eggs” under some sand and R had to dig to find them.
What you need
Sand
Rocks (painted)
Foil or plastic tray
Dinosaur figurines
Decorative stones
Other play items like a fish net, plastic spoon.
Stickts and leaves
I began by filling a tray with sand. I then buried some of our dinosaur eggs under the sand and added glass pebbles, leaves, and of course dinosaurs. I left some of our painted rocks on the surface to add to the scene.
Then it was time for my little archeologist to get to work! I gave R a small aquarium net and a plastic spoon. He scooped and poured the sand, looking for the hidden dinosaur eggs.
Jackpot! A dinosaur egg is uncovered.
R loved this activity and added many elements of his own to the imaginative scene including some plastic insects and frogs that we have used in our frog pond small world play scene. He was creating stories for all the dinosaurs and other animals as he played.
When he had found all the “eggs” he stacked them behind our tree and continued to play and dig around in the sand. I left the tray out and he kept coming back to it all day. I think this one is going to be popular around here for quite a while.
About Ness
Ness is the creator of One Perfect Day, a site full of creative ideas for kids to play and learn, family recipes, and information about positive parenting and connecting with our children. She is also a contributor at KidsActivitiesBlog.com. Ness loves creating fun kids’ activities and has decided that permanently having paint under her fingernails and play dough in her hair is a fashion statement. You can find One Perfect Day on Facebook and Twitter or follow along on Pinterest.
26 Comments
Fun with painted rocks – dinosaur imaginative play | One Perfect Day
September 25, 2012 at 8:35 am[…] you will find me over at Be A Fun Mum where I’m guest posting about a fun imaginative game / sensory bin I created for R. This […]
katepickle
September 25, 2012 at 11:15 amOh now I know a certain few kids in my house who would LOVE this!
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 25, 2012 at 11:25 pmThanks Kate! This has really been a hit with R. It has so many elements – the treasure hunt for the “eggs”, imagination in creating the small world scene and what child doesn’t love playing with sand?
Deborah
September 25, 2012 at 11:47 amOh this is so stinkin cute!!! And just in time – we are doing dinosaurs this week!
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 25, 2012 at 11:27 pmThank you so much Deborah! I can’t wait to see all the fun things you do in your classroom for dinosaur week.
stephanie
September 25, 2012 at 7:24 pmThose rocks are sure getting a lot of use! 🙂 I love the idea of using the rocks and the dinos and the fish net- so cool.
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 25, 2012 at 11:27 pmhahaha! They certainly are! I think I may need to start an entire “painted rocks” category on the blog. lol
Ali
September 25, 2012 at 7:48 pmI love those brightly coloured rocks. My girls would love to hunt for them. Great idea.
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 25, 2012 at 11:29 pmThank you Ali! Everyone loves a treasure hunt don’t they? 🙂 The great thing about these rocks is we spent a really lovely afternoon painting them and creating something wonderful and now we’ve found so many ways to play with them.
Janice - learning4kids
September 26, 2012 at 9:48 pmThis is such an awesome idea!! I can imagine my girls playing with this for hours.
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 27, 2012 at 1:41 amThanks Janice. My son has certainly had hours of fun with this activity and he keeps making up new stories to go along with it. It’s lots of fun to watch.
Penny
September 27, 2012 at 6:41 amSuch a simple activity but will provide hours of imaginative fun. I really need to paint some rocks. They look so funky!
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 27, 2012 at 9:56 pmPainting rocks is so much fun Penny. We’ve made all sorts of different ones and have come up with so many different games for them.
Kelly Be A Fun Mum
September 29, 2012 at 8:58 amNess, I adore your painted rocks and how you’ve used them in this creative play scene. Thanks so much for sharing it here on Be A Fun Mum.
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 30, 2012 at 11:54 pmThanks so much for having me here Kelly!
jode@mummymusingsandmayhem
September 30, 2012 at 9:32 pmThis is just such a lovely activity Ness!! Those stones are so beautiful and would surely encourage any child to want to get creative…thanks for the inspiration as always!!
Ness @ One Perfect Day
September 30, 2012 at 11:54 pmThank you Jode! They certainly have sparked my son’s imagination.
Debs
October 1, 2012 at 3:07 pmHow fun! I absolutely love the language development that comes from this type of play. I really must paint some rocks of our own too as those look so pretty!
Ness @ One Perfect Day
October 3, 2012 at 12:20 amThanks Debs! The language development really is an exciting aspect of this type of play, isn’t it? I love listening to my son’s stories as he plays with sensory tubs and small world scenes.
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April 16, 2013 at 10:05 pmI love this – Monkey will too
suzanne
May 2, 2013 at 2:39 amR would have been a palentoligist if he was searching for dinosaur bone or eggs. Archeologists study prehistory and ancient periods of history based on the examination of their physical remains like cities.
Paleontologists study the fossil remains of animal and plant life of past geological periods.
Sorry my father in law was a paleontologist and would have rolled over in his grave if anyone had refered to him as an archeologist.
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