Cheap Dig A Dino Tyrannosaurus Rex

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List Price: $11.99
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My son is into dinosaurs these days. He is four and needs some supervision with this project, but it is great fun for both his dad and I to help him with. It comes as a small brick, with a small brush and digging tool with the bones "embedded" within it. Then you saw away on it until you "discover the bones" and then you carefully brush away the bones and then put the skeleton together. Great fun. I don't know if older children would dig it as much but my four year old is "diggin'" it.

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Just did this kit with my five year old daughter. We did run the block under water to make it a bit easier to dig out the bones and minimize dust. We both had fun doing it, and read up on how paleontologists dig out real bones before and after completing it. The bones went together very easily, and my daughter played with them all afternoon. The cardboard display is flimsy, and the wax to hold the skeleton in place in it only works for a little while, but that's been the only downside.

UPDATE: It's now six months later, and my daughter still plays with this skeleton. While it comes apart sometimes, nothing has broken. (The cardboard display has long since gone in the recycling.) We're getting her another one soon. It's been a great investment in her interest in dinosaurs.

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What interesting experiences can you purchase for a young child for under $10? I don't know them all, but I do know that the Dig A Dino T-Rex is one of them. The key to this toy's enjoyment for us lay in two factors:

1. The joy of working with tools to discover/find something.

2. The ability to determine, through judicious application of water, how long it takes to get the model pieces out. In other words, the discovery of the bones can take as much or as little time as your child desires.

About that second point. Theoretically, if one submerged the block overnight and then broke it apart it could probably be finished in under an hour. On the other hand, if one never used water and kept to the tools provided, it could take days or even weeks. In our case, applying only enough water from a spray bottle to keep down the dust and help with particularly difficult pieces, we enjoyed it for one or two hours per day over a period of several days (we covered it with a towel when not being worked on).

The tools are a plastic hammer/scraper and a very small brush. The brush is effectively useless; it had so few bristles we actually used the blunt end of the handle more often. The hammer didn't see any use since it doesn't have any mass to do anything but the scraper, wide for safety no doubt, was the tool of choice, being effective both in scraping and levering.

The model itself is decent. It's detailed enough but very simplistic the ribcage is just two pieces, for example. The pieces fit together easily and the whole thing is robust enough to be displayed without needing to do anything else. It can even stand on its own.

But, again, to us the actual value of this toy lay in the time spent discovering the pieces (the journey, not the destination) with the resulting skeleton being an added bonus.

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After digging intermittently for an afternoon, my eight-year-old son needed some help putting the 12 pieces of plastic together. He considers the experience underwhelming, but it is worth noting that he did spend enough time to finish digging without much urging. Kids between 4 and 6 may enjoy this kit better.

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Even though I'm an adult (but a dinosaur fan), I originally purchased this kit as something silly/fun to do while watching TV. I ended up watching my little cousin's six-year old, however, and decided to use the kit with him, since I hadn't opened the box since purchasing it.

He LOVED it. I notice they have a mammoth kit, too, and I will definitely be stocking up on whatever other kits they carry. This kit is great for keeping a child busy, and we took turns because the digging tool takes a great deal of patience (in fact, when my little cousin left the room for a few minutes, I made sure to really chip big chunks of the rock out before he came back, since it can be time-consuming). Every time we unearthed a bone, however, it was an accomplishment for him, which was WONDERFUL to see. Great product, and I love that there's the assembly at the end. Every time my little cousin sees me, he keeps asking me if I have any more dinosaurs :) I'll have to remember to stock up.