Today in class our students participated in a few activities to see how hard their hearts work. First, students were asked to squeeze a tennis ball until they could see an indentation. This is about how much pressure the heart must exert each time it beats, pushing the blood through our system of arteries and veins. This was challenging enough, but then the class had to "pump blood" for a full minute by squeezing the tennis ball about 70 times in one minute. That is how many times the average heart beats in one minute. The class never worked so hard! They knew if the heart stopped, the body would eventually die. Of course, they did not want that to happen! The class realized their heart works very hard.
Our second activity focused on how much blood the heart pumps in one minute. Students could not beleive the heart pumps about 19 cups of blood each minute. Using a cup, a funnel, and a plastic tube, volunteers tried to "pump" 19 cups of blood (colored water) from one container to another. However, since valves in the heart must open and close each time the heart beats to prevent the blood from flowing backwards, a student had to pinch the tube closed once per second to simulate the action of the valves. The students could only get a few cups of "blood" transferred in a minute. Again they realized the heart works extremely hard! During this activity, the class discussed that the heart has 4 chambers, (2 atriums and 2 ventricles). The funnel represented an atrium, a place where the blood enters the heart. Click HERE to see the video clip we used to close our lesson today which shows and discusses how the heart works.
Prior to specific lessons on each body system such as the one discussed above on the circulatory system, our students enjoyed creating life-sized labeled illustrations of the body systems to compliment the research they completed on the major parts they were assigned. We have had a lot of fun learning about six major body systems and have learned A LOT in the process!
3 comments:
Wow! I wish I had been able to learn all this about the systems of the body when I was in fourth grade! These projects and experiments seemed really cool!!!
Loved reading about your classroom experience and watching the video on the heart you linked to. What a great learning opportunity for your students.
What an awesome lesson! This is what I love about blogging! It is a window into the minds, classrooms, experiences, etc. of others. I enjoyed watching the video; I am fascinated with learning about the body. When I taught Science, it was one of my favorite topics. You didn't mention a baster; I was curious if this was used as a representation of the heart pumping. I miss teaching Science!
Cudos,
Dorry
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