The Really, Really, Rreally Big Dinosaurby Richard Byrne is such a wonderful book. It is about a little dinosaur who has in his possession a jar of jelly beans that another bigger dinosaur wants. Actually he doesn’t want it, he demands it. He won’t settle for one jelly bean. No, he wants them all.
Math for Kids- Measuring
The little dinosaur tries to point out that they are not his beans. The bigger dinosaur doesn’t want to hear about them belonging to a friend. He struts around touting his strength and power.
In the end the little dinosaur draws him close enough to his friend’s mouth that the bigger dinosaur for the much bigger friend to clamp his teeth down on him. Thankfully the bigger friend is a herbivore who loves jelly beans.
In the end they all agree to share and the not be greedy. I bet he stop being a bully too.
What did we do to explore the book?
We did two math for kids measurement activities. One used non- standard measurement tools and the other used a ruler.
Non-Standard Measurement Tools
We measured three dinosaurs I created to resemble the big “greedy” dinosaur. Wooden cubes were used to measure each of the dinosaurs. The blue dinosaur is really a half a block shorter than we measured him, but we didn’t have half a block. I told my son we had to go up to the next number rather than go down to the number that would be a little short.
When we had measured the each dinosaur from the foot near its tail to the tip of its horn, we counted how many squares tall each dinosaur was.
A standard ruler was used to measure the dinosaurs. We used the inch side of the ruler rather than the metric side. It was much easier to measure using the ruler. The ruler had markings between the inches that allowed us to measure the dinosaur to the 1/2 and 1/4 inch.
We had an interesting discussion about non-standard and standard measurement. It was decided that the standard measurement was much more accurate. If we are measuring something and we want to know its exact measurement we will need to use a ruler.
Here are some more math for kids activities:
Free Printable Interactive Math Sheet for Kids
You will find more math for kids activities on my Early Learning Math board on Pinterest.
That’s such a simple yet effective way of exploring measurement within the context of this book. I love it!
I need to look for this for my twins. They love dinosaurs!
Sounds like a cute book and your math exploration was genius! Learning how to use a ruler is tough! You can’t start too early! –Lisa
I love all the different math posts lately! My kids are both into trying to measure things — haven’t tried measuring with cubes yet. I think we may need to get the wood blocks out!
What a cute book! Love that it lead to a math activity. Measuring Penny by Loreen Leedy is an amazing book for exploring non-standard measurement. Have you read it?
This is such a wonderful way to teach our kids…thanks for sharing! 🙂
What a fun twist on measurement for him!
Oh, yes, we loved this book too, and it’s such a wonderful way to extend it!
what a cool way to measure… broxton loves the measuring tape these days..
It is great to use something that children are interested in – we love dinosaurs! I have pinned this.
What a fun way to explore measurement- thanks for linking up to Discover & Explore this week!
You are the second blog I read this week about math books/games for kids! This is so great!! WHere did you get those little wooden cubes? Those are neat and remind me of 4th grade!
Kids love dinosaurs. I know little girls that love dino’s too! I am looking this book up and getting it! You can never have too many books!!!