1 cup flour
1 cup dried coffee grounds
1/2 cup table salt
1/4 cup craft sand
3/4 cup water
small plastic dinosaurs
a large bowl, whisk, and measuring cups
a group of giggling, enthusiastic kiddos
Before making the eggs we spent some time playing with and identifying the dinosaurs. I purchased a plastic tube of 14 dinosaurs from Michael's for this activity.
I went to Starbucks the day before and got one of their FREE bags of used coffee grounds. The recipe calls for dried coffee grounds. Ours were mostly dried, but not completely. This may vary just how much water you need. We passed around the coffee grounds for everyone to get a chance to smell them.
We mixed the coffee grounds and the flour together and used a whisk to blend them until the mixture was smooth. Ours were a little lumpy, so vigorous whisking was necessary. We made the most of the experience and passed the bowl and the whisk around so everyone got to help.
We then added the salt and blended until smooth, again. The kiddos were amazed at the color changes as we added each new ingredient.
The more, the merrier when it comes to mixing things. Everyone gets to help.
Next comes the craft sand. I had purchased a light brown colored sand from Michael's. It was a little glittery and the glitter would show through when we laid the eggs out in the sunlight to dry.
We then added the water. This amount may vary from what the recipe calls for. It depends on how dry the coffee grounds are. We doubled our recipe, but didn't quite double the amount of the water. It's better to add it a little at a time.
We then use a 1/2 cup scoop, putting some in the cup, having each child choose a dinosaur and lay it down in the scoop and then add more to cover it up. We then "plopped" the mixture out into the child's hands and have them form the egg around the dinosaur making sure all dinosaur parts are covered.
Once they were pleased with the egg, we laid them on a tray to dry. We've had them drying out in the sun during our 3 1/2 hour class time for a couple of days. Tomorrow we'll have a Dinosaur Egg Hunt where the children will find an egg and break it open to discover which baby egg they've found. Such fun!!
This sounds like a fun alternative to the paper mache ones we've made. In the end did it work out okay? Were the kids able to break it open? Would you do it again?
ReplyDeleteYes, yes, and yes. I was a little surprised how easy they were to break open. I thought it might be a little more challenging, but it worked out well. Where we live and when we did the project it was early June and temps are in the 90's, so we let ours dry outside. I would definitely do it again. It was kind of messy opening them, so you'd definitely want to do it outside. Mixing them up in class with the kids made the whole room smell like coffee since we were using coffee grounds, so it was a sensory activity, as well. You can see images of what they looked like when they were broken open on two of my posts: http://msbarbarasblog.blogspot.com/2012/07/dinosaurs-and-volcanoes-and-summer-oh.html and http://msbarbarasblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/volcanoes-and-dinosaurs-and-summer-oh.html
Delete