Years ago, I saw this book while I was buying groceries. I was instantly intrigued and the play enthusiast in me quickly bought two copies (it’s all about spreading the joy, right?)
A few years ago, I gave away the second copy I purchased as a gift to a friend, hoping it would bring some magic to her children and my own copy continued to hide away in a box in our storage room.
This past spring, Y discovered dinosaurs. And I finally had a dino enthusiast in the family. I knew that this November, the dinosaurs would be coming.
As an aside: We are a Muslim household that doesn’t observe Halloween or Christmas so I love the timing of this annual tradition. It will give my children something to look forward to during this time of year.
The idea of Dinovember was popularized by Refe and Susan Tuma from the United States. They share their story in the book I have, “What the Dinosaurs did Last Night.” It basically is built around the fact that every November, all the toy dinosaurs come to life and create mischief and messes each night once the children are in bed.
Now as an early childhood professional I know the ideas of toys coming to life wasn’t invented by any one person – children all over the world pretend that their toys are real. In fact, I created my first few dinosaur playscapes before I had even heard of dinovember while working with daycare children and designing emergent curriculum for them.
*Emergent curriculum essentially means designing play opportunities and “lessons” based on what a particular set of children are interested in after spending time observing them at play. This is in contrast to thematic based planning that has traditionally been used in early learning spaces (for example, Every September, all children will learn about apples and every October, they will always learn about pumpkins, thanksgiving and Halloween etc).
I had mentioned we might have some dinosaur visitors to Y at the end of October. Life got busy and it seems the dinosaurs missed the memo. One day in early November we were all together in the car and Y (who was almost 2.5 years old) started telling my husband that the dinos were going to come to our house. I was flooded with mom guilt. And a renewed sense of purpose.
The next day, the dinosaurs had their first appearance. And then every day after that, their shenanigans continued. Now, the dinosaurs that have come to inhabit our house are relatively tame and prefer to be make the children laugh. They are also not routinely nocturnal, sometimes opting to be found after school instead of first thing in the morning. They also sometimes like to surprise us while we’re out and about. Here are some photos from how Dinovember unfolded in our house.
The dinosaurs have been greatly encouraged by everyone’s reactions – the children’s shrieks of joys and laughter upon the initial discovery, Y’s retelling of all the things the “silly dinos” do to anyone who will listen, my husbands quiet smiles (I know he secretly loves it!) and the response of friends on social media.
I also see how this is encouraging the natural storytelling abilities of my daughter (now 6 years old) as she attempts to preserve the magic for her little brother and delight me with her own dinosaur playscapes.
Even though the dinos have stopped finding themselves in precarious predicaments, often when we are driving home, Y talks about how he can’t wait to get home and see what silly things the dinos are up to. I’m sure they will make a guest appearance (or ten) before next Dinovemeber.
Discovery Dome 