OMSH

I’m a History Major. Did you know that? Well, I am. And I’m a big Texas buff; this is my state and I’m darn proud of it. How then, with this glowing resume of Texan pride did I not know, until 2 weeks ago, that the Pleurocoelus (PLEW-roh-SEEL-us) became the Texas state dinosaur in 1997?

Perhaps it was because this Concurrent Resolution #57 came about after my schooling years were over? Or perhaps because I’ve never made it to Dinosaur Valley State park near Glen Rose in North Central Texas.

Or?

Maybe because I’ve never yet been called upon to teach a Texas Symbols class to Kindergarten through Second graders?

Either way, I know it now, and I gotta say we Texans can be very, VERY proud.

In Texas we do everything BIG. We like our oil, we like our beef, and we love our football, but most of all – we can boast of having one of the biggest land animals that ever walked the face of the earth as one of our Texas Symbols.

The Pleurocoelus is of the Sauropod Infraorder and the Brachiosauridae Family – known as the Dinosaur giants, they would have towered high above tall buildings, measuring 45 to 60 ft. long and weighing in about 10 tons.

Oh yea, we do it big in Texas all right.

The only thing that doesn’t line up with the Texan ‘way’ was this dinosaur went and decided to be a herbivore – which I guess was best, seeing as how it couldn’t really be sly while hunting prey.

After giving a short history of our lovely long neck, me and my homeschool co-op class measured out 45 feet, and then, 15 more feet to hit the 60 foot marker. The kids were AMAZED (as was I) by the visual of just how LOOOOOOONG that long neck really was.

Then, we did Pleurocoelus stretches – one arm up stretched high up in the air, hand tight in a fist (to represent the head), and then the alternating back leg pointed steadfast on the ground (representing the tail).

As we reeeeached up for our leaves high atop the tree our leg (tail) remained down. When we bowed low to the ground for low lying vegetation our leg and foot stretched high into the air to counterbalance our looooong necks.

These are Pleurocoelus stretches. You should try them some time when no one is looking – it isn’t as easy as it sounds.

Then, we had a relay where felt pieces were all amuck on the floor and had to be placed together to shape a dinosaur, one running player after another.

I love carpeted walls and press-on velcro!

After learning, stretching and running, we feasted on the herbivore sugar cookies made by my lovely assistant, Emelie.

We also colored a Pleurocoelus coloring page and talked about what it would be like to travel the migration route of the ‘dinosaur highway’ – the beaches off an inland sea that scientists believed stretched from north to south through North America.

“It must have been so loud!”
(We pounded the floor and screeched and moaned in our best dinosaur voices.)

“They could probably walk faster than a car!”
(We walked, skipped, RAN really, really fast.)

“They could probably see for one thousand miles!”
(I didn’t object, but reduced the number a bit.)

“If they were on the beach they wouldn’t even get killed by a TIDAL WAVE!”
(We all died in the midst of a make-believe tidal wave; one of the boys caught a wave and ended up saved on a dinosaur’s back.)

“My Grandpa is in heaven and he might have met some dinosaurs.”
(Others objected that dinosaurs are too heavy for heaven. No discussion was made about Stratocumulus perlucidus clouds, sorry.)

Wow, it is serious stuff – this being silly.
I loved it.

Next class?
Texas State Flower – the Bluebonnet.
My brain is already working.

This post has been re-published following a database deletion on November 1, 2008; sorry all comments were lost.