Human Body Unit - Oxygen and Carbon Dioxide Activity

Week 1: We modeled the Oxygen-Carbon Dioxide cycle.

Now that we are finished with our Cell Unit Study we are moving onto the rest of the human body following The Way We Work by David Macaulay.

Trees and plants take in carbon dioxide and give off oxygen. Humans breath in oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide. While inside the body red blood cells exchange oxygen molecules for carbon dioxide molecules as they travel through the veins and arteries. This continuous cycle supplies us with the oxygen required for life.

For this week's project I gave the kids some marble and track toys and asked them to make a model of the carbon dioxide - oxygen cycle.

I was super impressed with what they came up with and how fast they did it.

The forest is represented by the green cylinders in the upper left of the model. The blue loop leading from the forest enters the human body and passes through the black and yellow square (lungs) before returning to the forest. This is the track for the oxygen molecules leaving the forest and the carbon dioxide molecules returning to the forest.

The green funnel is the human head, and the red piece is the heart. The black and yellow square is the lungs. The blue tracks  which aren't part of the loop are arms and legs. The black track is meant to represent the veins and arteries inside the human body. It travels around the body and also passes through the lungs where the oxygen and carbon dioxide enter and leave the body. The red cylinders on the track are the red blood cells that deliver the oxygen and pick up the carbon dioxide.

The assignment was simple "use the tracks to create a model of the carbon dioxide - oxygen cycle". I think they liked it because they used creativity and engineering to come up with their own design. I liked it because it was simple and they understood the concept.

We have many more human body science activities coming up. There are three ways to receive notification of new posts; Like us on Facebook, sign up to Follow by Email, Join the blog. There are buttons for all three on the right-hand side.





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7 comments:

  1. As a current Anatomy & Physiology student, I have naturally started teaching my kids about the Human Body too. So far we have went over the Ears, Eyes,& Bones. I really think this is an important topic of study. plus, kids are really enjoying learning about it ;)
    Besides my own books from class, we have used websites like youtube (has tons of videos to watch) and I have also found a bunch of free learning games websites online for my kids to play ( incase you are interested here is the website to my fav one ~> http://www.learninggamesforkids.com/health_games_body_parts.html )

    Great Post & Great Blog :)

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    1. That looks like a good website. Thanks for the link.

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  2. I love how you always get your kids creating to help them understand what they are learning!

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  3. So creative! Can't wait to see the rest of your Human Body posts! Thanks for linking up to Mom's Library!

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  4. Hands on activities are great for really grasping what they've read or learned. We're also studying anatomy using another curriculum. I found that it's sometimes challenging for them to remember the different scientific terms. So I've been using SpellingCity to make up word lists so they can play some fun games like Match-it. They match the definition to the word. There are other fun games like crossword puzzles and Unscramble there too. I've found it really helps to reinforce and remember what we've learned....helps me too. ;)

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  5. That is very creative. I love how they got so stuck in.

    Thanks for linking to Fun Sparks. xx

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