Long Ago or Today?
Sorting animals we know from fossils and animals alive today.
How it plays
Animals drift about; your child drags each one to its time: long ago, like Muttaburrasaurus and Diprotodon, or today, like the wombat and the echidna. When an animal gets there, Ruby Roo says one thing about it. Two of each first, then more.
What it's for
Sorting animals we know from fossils and animals alive today. There is no score to lose and no way to fail: a wrong move is met with a gentle nudge, and a level ends when it's done.
Away from the screen: Then and now
About two minutes, with things most homes have.
- Find two photos: one of you as a child, and one of you now.
- Ask your child which is long ago and which is today.
- Do the same with two toys, one old and one new.
- Talk about something that was here long before you were.
Three questions to ask while they play
- Which animals can we still see today?
- How do we know what dinosaurs looked like?
- Is the crocodile from long ago, or today?
Play together
Things to say or ask
- A wombat! Do wombats still live today?
- Muttaburrasaurus lived long, long ago.
Taking turns on one device: One of you names an animal; the other puts it in its time.
If they find it hard
Set it to slow and one of each. The crocodile is a good one to talk about: crocodiles live today, and their family goes all the way back to the time of the dinosaurs.
Every fact, and where it comes from
What Ruby Roo says in Long Ago or Today? was checked against the page it links to.
- Muttaburrasaurus was discovered near Muttaburra in central Queensland. About 7 metres long, it was mainly or entirely a plant-eater with an unusual rounded bony snout, and lived between about 125 and 100 million years ago. (Australian Museum)
- Diamantinasaurus, nicknamed Matilda, was a titanosaur (a long-necked sauropod) found near Winton in central Queensland. It was about 15 metres long, a plant-eater, and lived in the Late Cretaceous, about 90 million years ago. (Australian Museum)
- Leaellynasaura, from Dinosaur Cove in Victoria, was about a metre long and ate low plants such as ferns. Its enlarged eye sockets may have helped it see through dark polar winters, when Victoria lay near the South Pole, about 106 million years ago. (Australian Museum)
- Diprotodon optatum is the largest marsupial known: up to 3.8 metres long, 1.7 metres at the shoulder and about 2,800 kilograms. Its feet turned in, as in wombats. Hundreds have been found at Lake Callabonna in South Australia. It became extinct about 25,000 years ago. (Australian Museum)
- Isisfordia, a crocodile relative from Queensland that lived about 100 million years ago alongside the dinosaurs, is the oldest known direct ancestor of living crocodiles. (Australian Museum)
What it practises
- Sorting by two things. Putting things into groups by what they look like, then by two things at once: orange and round, small and pointy.
AC9MFSP01 (Mathematics, Foundation); AC9MFM01 (Mathematics, Foundation); EYLF 4.2 (Early Years Learning Framework V2.0) - Australian animals. What animals look like and where they live (My animal friends cards).
AC9SFU01 (Science, Foundation); AC9S1U01 (Science, Year 1)
The codes are from the Early Years Learning Framework V2.0 (for children from birth to five) and the Australian Curriculum v9 (Foundation to Year 2). Each links to the official wording. Every skill, and the games for it.
What it costs, and what we collect
Nothing, and nothing. There is no account, no advertising and no tracking of any kind. Which games have been played is remembered on your own device and is never sent anywhere. The full version is here, and it's short.
Where it lives
Long Ago or Today? is part of Fossil Finders. It works on a phone, a tablet or a classroom screen, and once it's been opened it keeps working with no signal at all.
Updated