Science for Young Kids: Anatomy & Physiology - The Cardiovascular System

The fourth lesson that I covered in an recent A&P unit involved the cardiovascular system.  Previous lessons centered on the skeletal system, the central nervous system and the respiratory system.  

Activities:

• Watched this video on the cardiovascular system from aboutkidshealth.
• Printed out copies of this blood flow diagram from Children's Heart Institute, discussed the diagram at a high level, cut it out and pasted it on our body maps in the appropriate location.
• Felt for our pulse at our wrists and in our necks, and listened to each other's heartbeats by putting our ear against each other's chests - a stethoscope would have been great, but we didn't have one.  
• Got the kids physically involved in what we were learning by enacting blood flow in the cardiovascular system.
  • We laid down a red blanket and a blue blanket next to each other to represent the left atrium/ventricle and right atrium/ventricle, respectively.  
  • We set sawhorses or chairs on one end of each blanket and in the middle of each blanket to represent the valves of the heart - there are 4 valves, so we needed 4 sawhorses or chairs (I looked for anything I had on hand that could be crawled through and wasn't too long).   The sawhorses/chairs in the middle of the blankets represented the valves between the atria and ventricles (on both the left/red blanket and right/blue blanket sides of the heart), and the sawhorses/chairs at the end of each blanket represented the valves leading out of the ventricles into the aorta (left side/red blanket) and pulmonary artery (right side/blue blanket).
  • I inflated red and blue balloons to represent oxygen (red) and carbon dioxide (blue). 
  • I stood to the side, and I represented dual roles of lungs and the rest of the body - I just moved back and forth between nearby different spots in the room to fulfill my two roles.
  • Then the kids pretended to be red blood cells (RBC's) rushing through the the cardiovascular system among heart and lungs and the rest of the body.  We started with them holding blue balloons (carbon dioxide) and me holding red balloons (oxygen), assuming they were RBC's headed back to the heart from the rest of the body.  With that assumption their path was:  
    1. Onto the blue blanket (right atrium)
    2. Through the sawhorse/chair in the middle of the blue blanket (tricuspid valve) onto the other half of the blue blanket (right ventricle)
    3. Through the sawhorse/chair at that end of the blue blanket (pulmonary valve)
    4. Over to me-as-the-lungs where they gave me their blue balloons (carbon dioxide) and I gave them my red balloons (oxygen)
    5. Onto the red blanket (left atrium)
    6. Through the sawhorse/chair in the middle of the red blanket (mitral valve) onto the other half of the red blanket (left ventricle)
    7. Through the sawhorse/chair at the end of the red blanket (aortic valve)
    8. Over to me-as-the-rest-of-the-body where they gave me their red balloons (oxygen), and I gave them my blue balloons (carbon dioxide)
  • And then through the whole pathway again, as I called out each part of the pathway they were completing.  To emphasize how exertion causes the heart to beat faster to meeting the increasing oxygen delivery/carbon dioxide removal needs of the body's tissues, I-as-the-rest-of-the-body would jump up and down and urge the kids (my little red blood cells) to move faster, faster through the pathway because I really needed the oxygen and needed to get rid of the carbon dioxide.  The kids loved trying to see how fast they could run to where they needed to go and crawl through all the "valves."  Not only did they really enjoy this very physical learning activity, but they were talking about the pathway later, indicating to me that this really helped them understand the basics of circulatory blood flow.
  • Items needed for this activity:
    • Chairs, sawhorses, open-ended boxes or other items that can be crawled through and aren't too long
    • 1 Red and 1 blue blanket (or other blankets of differing colors could work if red and blue aren't available)
    • Red and blue balloons (or other balloons of differing colors could work if red and blue aren't available)

Discussion points:

• The cardiovascular system is the means by which our bodies move blood throughout our bodies.  Our bodies need to move blood in order to deliver oxygen and nutrients to all the parts of our bodies and to take away carbon dioxide and wastes that are produced by our bodies activities.
• The cardiovascular system is made up of the heart, lungs, veins and arteries (blood vessels) - "cardio" refers to the heart and "vascular" refers to the blood vessels.
• The heart is a muscle that pumps our blood throughout our body.   This muscle has four "rooms," or chambers, and works all the time - if it were ever to stop working for long, we would die.  The heart pushes the blood to the lungs to get oxygen and then pushes the oxygenated blood out to the rest of our bodies.  Valves in our heart keep the blood from flowing backwards between heartbeats.
• We can tell our heart is beating by feeling our pulse at certain places in our body where the arteries are nearer to the surface of our skin, such as on our wrists below our thumbs or in our necks under the jaw,  or by listening to our heartbeat with a stethoscope (we can hear someone else's heartbeat just by laying our ear against their chest).
• The lungs breathe in oxygen that our bodies need, and breathe out the carbon dioxide of which our bodies need to be rid.
• The veins and arteries are flexible tubes through which the blood flows from the heart and lungs to the other parts of our bodies.  The arteries carry oxygenated blood (blood with more oxygen) away from the heart and lungs, and the veins carry deoxygenated blood (blood with less oxygen) back to our heart and lungs.
• We can help to keep our heart healthy by exercising, eating healthily, maintaining a healthy weight, managing stress and not smoking.

Vocabulary words:
​Cardiovascular, atrium (left and right), ventricle (left and right), valves, arteries, veins, pulse, oxygen, carbon dioxide

Sources:

• KidsHealth website can provide some background information for discussing the circulatory system.
• This aboutkidshealth site has the video mentioned above as well as some other high level information for kids regarding the circulatory system. This page on the site is geared more towards adults, but it briefly explains the blood flow pathway.