The Human Body Unit



Learning about the systems of the human body was the most exciting unit we have done this year. The kids were just as interested and engaged as I was and that is always a plus. When I did this lesson with my oldest son some years ago, we enjoyed it but not this much. Although I repeated some of the same activities with him, there were so many more we incorporated this time around.

I decided to share everything here in one blog post to help all you busy homeschoolers. It's time consuming looking for books and sifting through relevant videos on YouTube.

Below you will find the books we read and activities we completed along with links and PDFs. It was a lot of fun for us, I hope you find this post useful!



I used R.E.A.L Science Odyssey with my older son from 1st-3rd grade and I still use it with my little ones because it is well organized and well written, easy to read and understand, and offers interesting labs for the kids;however, it can be bland if used by itself. So, I make sure to use many additional resources, readings, and videos to make science more exciting.  I also prefer incorporating writing and art into everything we do to keep the kids interested in the subject, which this curriculum does not offer. And let's face it, just teaching out of a text book and worksheets is never super fun.



Here are some of the awesome titles we picked up from the local library and a few we already have at home:
  • The Magic School Bus Presents The Human Body
  • The Magic School Bus: Inside the Human Body, by: Joanna Cole
  • The Magic School Bus: Case of the Missing Bones (Easy Chapter Book)
  • Inside Out Human Body, by: Luann Columbo
  • KingFisher Fast Facts: Incredible Human Body
  • The Astounding Nervous System, by: John Burstein (Slim Goodbody's Body Buddies series)
  • The True Book: The Nervous System
  • Your Lungs, by: Anne Ylvisaker
  • Your Respiratory System, by: Judith Jango-Cohen
  • The Circulatory Story, by: Mark K. Corcoran
  • How Your Body Works (Henderson Publishing)
Science kits:
Magic School Bus Human Body Kit
Delta Education "Just One Me" DNA  building kit

Videos:
Activities:

1. With every system we did a short write up.


2. Brain Hemisphere Hat: I found this awesome activity from ellenjmchenry.com. It has all the parts of the brain labeled and kids can easily point to and identify  where certain functions take place. We used this with the book, The Astounding Nervous System, by: John Burstein (Slim Goodbody's Body Buddies series)  Brain Hemisphere Hat PDF

3.  Blood Model- We made blood models out of play dough.



Plasma (Yellow)- It makes up most of the blood. It is like water.


Platelets (blue)- They are the tiniest parts in your blood and plug up cuts to stop bleeding. They are like the construction workers in the blood stream.


Red Blood Cells (Red)- they are round candy shaped cells that carry oxygen from the heart throughout the body through arteries. The oxygen makes them red. Once they have given all the oxygen out they turn blue and travel back to the heart through veins.


White Blood Cells (brown)- Biggest cells in your body. They are the defenders of the body. They attack and destroy harmful bacteria that enters your body.

4. Food Pyramid- along with learning about the digestive system we discussed healthy food choices and why it is important to make healthy choices. They went through the grocery papers and cut out pictures of items for each food group.

                                   

5. Color Me Human Body- As we progressed through our study we would color the organs we covered that day. In the end, the kids ended up with a pretty awesome looking model. Color Me- Human Body PDF






Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Magic Tree House #3- Mummies in the Morning Unit

Image
King Tut's Sarcophagus at the California Science Center This was a really exciting unit. We spent about two and a half weeks learning about ancient and current day Egypt. We were very lucky to have the King Tut exhibit currently running at the California Science Center and saw some of the wonderful treasures kept in King Tut's tomb. The IMAX movie showed us the story of Ancient Egypt and how the tomb was discovered. We all learned so much. We learned so much more than history and geography in this unit study. We studied geometry as we learned about the Great Pyramids. Discussed the social structure of the Egyptians and compared it to ours and also briefly discussed social injustices. We built our vocabulary and became junior Egyptologists! We used the  MTH History and Geography Notebook to track our learning and concluded by writing in Annie's Adventure Diary.
Read more

Juggling Homeschool, House, Family, Activities, and Me-Time

Image
Folks always ask how I manage homeschooling, taking care of the house, the kids, the husband, and extended family obligations. I try to give the most practical advice, and this is pretty much how it goes.... There's an episode of The Office where Will Farrell's character does a juggling routine with invisible balls. It's a hilarious scene as he goes around the room intensely focused on the invisible balls while the rest of the office staff look at him like he's a total maniac! This is exactly what homeschool mothers look like! We have so much to juggle that other folks don't see. We are responsible for teaching our children manners, emotional management, life skills, their extra curricular activities, and the added responsibility of their academics; all while still having to manage the household duties, and the needs and concerns of everyone else around us. It feels like an impossible task, but in my experience the first step to being able to manage all of your resp
Read more