The Cetiosaurus was a misunderstood dinosaur for a long period of time simply due to the massive size of its vertebrae. In fact, it was mistakenly believed to be a whale. From the late Jurassic period this large dinosaur was found in England and Europe. Its limbs were solid and stubby and its tail long. This was a dinosaur that would have weighed tons and was VERY primitive.
We had one video for this dinosaur – I’m a Dinosaur.
Surprisingly for a dinosaur that roamed all over Europe there are not that many links to share. I will start with our colouring page HERE. Emanuel really enjoyed this one as the giant herbivore was only one in a scene of dinosaurs. Animal Planet has a lengthy article HERE. DinosaurKing has some general statistics HERE. KidsDinos has the usual charts HERE. Dinosaurs.about.com touches on our dinosaur HERE. EnchantedLearning has a fact sheet HERE. And finally, Wiki has their article HERE.
Do you have a yearning to learn more about this rare, unique and amazing mammal? Well, here are all the resources, links, etc that we used to learn about this Australian animal!!
Electric Animals by Natalie Lunis (this has a two page piece on the platypus’ ability to use electroreceptors to find food)
Platypus by Chris Riddell (a story book not a non fiction book)
A Platypus, Probably by Sneed B. Collard III
Platypus, A Century-long Mystery by William Caper
Crafty Bits:
Make your own Platypus on Learn Create Love by using their instructions HERE. We put our legs on with brads and went without the googly eyes.
Make your own Platypus paperbag puppet using instructions by Danielle’s Place HERE. The cutting is a little advanced on the feet for true preschoolers but we managed!
We didn’t make it to this craft but it looks fun, make your own Perry the Platypus out of felt and foam HERE.
Platypus notebooking pages with colour image of a swimming platypus HERE.
Templates that we used for our end of book facts of interest HERE.
Not so much a worksheet but a POEM!! 4-40 has a great platypus poem HERE.
We have an amazing picture of platypus babies thanks to Facebook via Dr. Carin Bondar – Biologist with a Twist. Keep in mind her Facebook profile HERE does have some more mature content this picture is certainly worth it! The tagline with this picture when it made its way to my timeline is as follows:
Here’s your daily dose of adorable – baby platypuses! There’s no official name for baby platypuses, but they’re often referred to as puggles or platypups. Platypuses are one of the five extant species of monotreme, meaning that they are mammals that lay eggs. It’s also one of the very few venomous mammals – the male has a “spur” that’s capable of delivering enough venom to kill a small dog.
Babies
Videos:
I will for the most part embed, but some do not allow it. Hopefully these will remain valid videos for some time! Our first video is from youTube subscriber 911TRUTHINATOR and is a longer educational piece on the “World’s Strangest Animal.”
National Geographic and their dangerous hunter themed video. I will warn you, they pump up the platypus to seem scary (??) the kids did NOT approve.
A short video of the Senior Platypus Keeper Ian Elton with Ember the 6 month old platypus.
In Australia, Go Paddling With the Platypus. Seriously… we live on the wrong continent. This video gives a bit of a close look to a playful platypus.
Check out the video below to see a platypus doing platypus things at Mount Field National Park.
Of course there are all the moments of Perry the Platypus on Phineas and Ferb. We specifically borrowed The Perry Files from the library. Wild Kratts also have a platypus focused episode called Platypus Cafe that you can purchase on Amazon.com.
Helpful links:
Wonder how the platypus got its name? Well Wiki Answers knows right HERE.
National Geographic Kids Creature Feature platypus HERE.
KidsBiology.com has a brief page on the platypus HERE.
Part of the lapbook calls for looking at the Echidna who is the other mammal in the Monotreme family. So here are our links that we used to supplement what tiny bit of information we had in our library books!
EnchantedLearning has a page with an anatomy picture HERE.
Activity Village has a mini book we used to record what we learned HERE. We took the little file folder shape from the lapbook and made it into a pocket to put our mini book in.
We used two videos with our Echidna. I am warning you now, youTube seems to carry a lot of information on the male reproductive organs of the Echidna. The two videos I have below do NOT cover this aspect as I did not feel that the… uniqueness of this portion of the animal was necessary to our learning.
First a National Geographic Video – World’s Weirdest.
And our second video about an Echidna Puggle at Taronga Zoo. Unlike the platypus, the echidna has an official name for its babies – the puggle.
And that is that! Here are a few of our pages! I hope this comes in helpful. If it does, please send me a message, leave a comment… etc.
Whose name reminds me of a cleaning product! BUT that is not what is amazing. This theropod existed in the Early Cretaceous period in Europe and England where it was the ONLY fish eating dinosaur known to date! With its crocodile like head and long claws it is has more teeth than a Tyrannosaurs Rex and is tailor made to hunt at the edge of lakes and rivers for fish. In fact, a fossilized skeleton was found with fish remains partially digested where its stomach would have been! Very cool!
Emanuel especially enjoyed this one with its very unique features and characteristics. We have 2 videos to share today off youTube. Emanuel has been choosing his dinosaurs from the I’m a Dinosaur list so I will start with that one. The other has more actual data and images of fossils. I hope they are helpful!
And now for our links! I will start with the one connected to the Natural Museum who were involved in the unearthing of the original amazing fossilized skeleton HERE. Jurassic Park Wikia has their page HERE, apparently this dinosaur was showcased or mentioned on a Jurassic Park movie! Dinosaurs.about.com has TWO pages on this dinosaur. A point form page HERE, and a 10 questions page HERE. EnchantedLearning has a page on this fish eating dino but surprisingly without a real picture or diagram HERE. Kidsdinos.com has a good timeline and map HERE. KidsDigDinos has a great fact sheet with a knowledge question HERE. Don’t forget Wiki’s usual dry article HERE. And of course our colouring page can be found HERE.
