DIY Dinosaur Grab Game
My son has always been a fan of dinosaurs hence why this is our third dinosaur themed activity for the Storybook Summer. Take a look at our previous dinosaur themed activities – our Dinosaur Sensory Bin and our Dinosaur Dig activity using kinetic sand. Recently Adam has fallen in love with a new dinosaur themed story – Gigantosaurus by Jonny Duddle.
The story gives an important lesson about telling the truth as Bonehead is the original boy-dinosaur who cried wolf, or in this story, Gigantosarus! Adam loves to shout at the top of his voice “His feet go stomp! His jaws go crunch! In the blink of an eye you’ll be his lunch!” I wanted to design an activity that involved dinosaurs grabbing things with their mouth but also worked on taking turns, sharing and helped with some motor skills too so here is it our very own DIY Dinosaur Grab Game.
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Find more Dinosaur Reading inspiration for kids with our top Dinosaur Books for budding Paelontologists
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Materials needed to play Dinosaur Grab
* Dinosaur glove puppets similar to these on Amazon. We had two Triceratops and one Tyrannosaurus Rex.
* Mini Multicolour Glitter Eggs
* Trays and timer (optional)
How to set up Dinosaur Grab
Place the dinosaur counters and the mini glitter eggs into a tray and mix them around. Position a tray on either side – these will be used to put the counters in for each team. Each player chooses which dinosaur glove puppet they would like to be.
How to play Dinosaur Grab
The object of the game is to get as many items into your tray as possible by picking up the objects using the dinosaur glove puppet. This is not as easy as it sounds and the activity works on both fine and gross motor skills.
We played the game in several ways. First I gave the boys time to practice using the dinosaur glove puppet to pick up the small items. It took some time before they could confidently manipulate the plastic puppet.
Next, we moved onto a timed activity. I gave the boys 20 seconds to see how many items they could get into their own tray. This was a dinosaur version of Hungry Hippos! The boys could pick up a combination of dinosaurs and eggs. At the end of the game, we estimated to see who we thought had picked up the most items and then counted them to see if our estimations were correct.
Want even more Dinosaur Inspiration then head on over to our BIG LIST of dinosaur activities and crafts for kids
After several games, I challenged the boys to a harder version. This time Adam could only pick out the glitter eggs whilst his friend could only take the dinosaurs. This game was much harder. It required the boys to sort through the items, use their fine motor skills to pick up individual items and use lots of patience
Our dinosaur version of Hungry Hippos was a lot of fun and gave the boys hand muscles a great workout too.
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Emma Edwards
During a difficult pregnancy suffering from Hyperemesis Gravidarum (HG) Emma vowed to make every day an adventure once she had recovered. Adventures of Adam is the outcome of completing a 100 day play challenge with Adam as part of that promise. Emma has a section dedicated to HG friendly play activities so that Mums can still be part of their children’s play whilst they are ill.