Dinosaur Presentations For Kids

[ltokuda]

Hi All!  Earlier this year, I did a dinosaur presentation for my son's Kindergarten/1st grade combo class.  I thought I would share it here in case anyone else is interested in doing something similar:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1_z7EKB1R0x4OdKgWJwirVWPkbosiHzNoJO3VwjZ9DiQ/edit?usp=sharing_eidp&invite=CNuQ7O4G&ts=580be3d0

Also, my son is in the 2nd grade now and his class will be learning about dinosaurs later in the school year.  He wants me to do another presentation but I'm not sure if I should do the same one or not.  I was thinking that since the kids will be learning about dinosaurs already, a general introduction to dinosaurs wouldn't be that interseting.  It might be better to build on what they learned and do a deeper dive on some subjects. 

One topic I was thinking of is talking about is how scientists learn more about dinosaurs beyond just the fossils: genetics, compartive anatomy, computer modeling, building models, etc.

If any of you have some suggestions, I would really appreciate it.  Or if you have some presentations available and are willing to share them, that would be great.

Thanks!

[DinoLord]

Nice presentation! Doesn't seems particularly dumbed down; hopefully it went well with the students.

I think you could definitely do a bit more of a specialized presentation. Maybe discuss how scientists and artists decide what dinosaurs looked like? This could include some of the ideas you have like comparative anatomy and computer modeling. Though I think genetics and phylogenies may be a bit too much for second graders...

Alternatively you could present on a specific subset of dinosaurs, like dinosaurs (and other fossil organisms) native to your area, or the relationship between dinosaurs and birds.

[ltokuda]

Hi, Dinolord!  Thank you for the great suggestions!

Yes, the presentation went surprisingly well.  Initially, I was worried that the kids might lose interest but it turned out to be far from the case.  Instead, the kids had so many questions and comments that I had to cut them off in order to keep the talk to under an hour and a half.  For each slide, I used a 1/40 scale dinosaur toy to show the kids what a model of each dinosaur looked like.  They were so excited and fascinated the whole time.