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Digestive System Activity

The document provides information about activities to teach students about the human digestive system. The activities include measuring and assembling a model of the digestive system using string, observing how sugar dissolves in water, chewing crackers without swallowing, simulating mechanical and chemical digestion, exploring how paper towel surface area affects water absorption, and acting out food traveling through a simulated digestive system. The overall lesson allows students to explore the key organs and processes of digestion.

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Leena Bhai
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241 views5 pages

Digestive System Activity

The document provides information about activities to teach students about the human digestive system. The activities include measuring and assembling a model of the digestive system using string, observing how sugar dissolves in water, chewing crackers without swallowing, simulating mechanical and chemical digestion, exploring how paper towel surface area affects water absorption, and acting out food traveling through a simulated digestive system. The overall lesson allows students to explore the key organs and processes of digestion.

Uploaded by

Leena Bhai
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Travel Brochure

The Body System Travel Agency has just hired the class to give tours through the various body
systems. Their first task is to create a travel brochure to highlight the imports and exports of each
area -- circulatory, digestive, nervous and so on -- as well as the "trendy" spots and exciting activities
the systems contain. Also mention any dangers or precautions that tourists should be aware of when
visiting each system. During this activity, students will not only visit the digestive system and show
how it works, but they will also see how food is used to nourish the other body systems as well.
Students may also create commercials to highlight each body system tour.

What Happens When You Eat?

Kelly Ludwig Lincoln-Way High School


1801 East Lincoln Highway
New Lenox IL 60451
(815) 485-7655

Objectives:

These activities will show students what organs aid in digestion and how
digestion occurs in the human body. This lesson maybe appropriate for middle
grades, but is designed for the upper grade curricula.

Materials Needed:

Activity #1: How Long is the Digestive System?

- yarn (at least 4 different colors)

Activity #2: Digestion

- sugar cubes

- granulated sugar

- 2 clear cups filled with water

Activity #3: Carbohydrate Digestion

- unsalted soda crackers (2 per student)

Activity #4: Hands on Digestion

- a small lump of hamburger (meatball size)

- one plastic baggie

- 1M HCl
- Digestive Juice A (pepsin, trypsin and water)

- Digestive Juice B (bile salts, pancreatin enzyme and water)

Activity #5: How do Villi aid the Small Intestine in Absorption?

- paper towels (10 per group)

- 4 cups of an equal amount of water

- graduated cylinder

Activity #6: A Digestive System Simulation

- large thin plastic bag - newspaper

- paper sacks (2 sizes) - Zip-lock bags

- M&M's candy - masking tape

- markers & paper - sponges

- trash can - labeled spray bottles of water

Strategy:

Activity #1: How Long is the Digestive System

Have students cut a piece of yarn according to the following measurements.

Allow students to use different color yarn to represent different organs. After

the yarn has been cut tie the pieces together.

Esophagus 25 cm

Stomach 20 cm

Small Intestine 700 cm

Large Intestine 150 cm

TOTAL 895 cm

Activity #2: Digestion

Place a sugar cube in a cup of water. Place about a spoonful of granulated

sugar in the other cup of water. Observe what happens.


Activity #3: Carbohydrate Digestion

Have the students chew two unsalted soda crackers for two minutes without

swallowing.

Activity #4: Hands on Digestion

Place the hamburger, 3 eyedroppers full of 1M HCl, one tablespoon of

Digestive Juice A and two tablespoons of Digestive Juice B into a plastic bag.

Knead the bad with your hands (simulates the stomach) for about 10-15 minutes,

it will have been reduced to mainly liquid and have a definite odor.

Activity #5: How do Villi aid the Small Intestine in Absorption?

Compare how 1, 2, 3, and 4 folded paper towels absorb. Dip each paper

towel into a cup of water (use the same amount of water in each cup). Record

the volume of water left in the cup (using a graduated cylinder).

Activity #6: A Digestive System Simulation

Procedure:

Things to make ahead of time:

1. FOOD TUBE: Lay out two parallel lines of tape on the floor, 3'

apart and long enough for half the class to stand

shoulder to shoulder on one side of the parallel

lines.

2. FOOD PARTICLE: The food particle consists of M&M's placed in

small zip-lock bags. These are placed in wadded

newspapers in small paper sacks. Place the small

sacks in larger sacks with added newspaper. Place

all sacks and add newspaper until the large

plastic bag is full. This bag is then taped or

tied closed to complete the food particle.

Action:
1. Peristaltic Movement: Put the food particle to be eaten at one end of the

food tube and a large trash can at the other. Have students line up on

both sides, facing each other, squeeze the food particle the length of the

food tube.

2. Digestion: Label and/or instruct the players. As the food comes to a

student they should narrate what they are doing and why.

Teeth - tear food apart (break plastic bag)

Saliva - use spray bottles to moisten food particle

Stomach - tear small bags apart

Pancreatic juices - spray food

Small Intestine - absorbs food, find bags of candy and pass to blood

(the teacher can play the role of the blood)

Large Intestine - reabsorbs water, sponge up water on the floor

Rectum/Anus - puts the waste papers in the trash can

Performance Assessment:

At the completion of this lesson students should be able to answer the


following questions:

1. What system in your body is the same length as the completed piece of
yarn? What is it's length (in centimeters, in feet)?
2. From your observations in Activity #2, what can you conclude must be
done to food before digestion begins?
3. What physical and chemical changes occurred to the soda cracker?
4. What caused the physical and chemical changes to the soda cracker?
5. Did you notice a taste change in the soda cracker?
6. How was mechanical digestion simulated in Activity #4.
7. What evidence was their that chemical digestion occurred in the
hamburger?
8. Which paper towel had the largest surface area?
9. Which cup had the highest volume of water left?
10. How do the villi (of the small intestine) aid in absorption?
11. Follow the path of a food particle through the digestive system;
include the organs and their functions.
Conclusion:

These six activities will enhance the student's knowledge of what organs
aid in digestion and how digestion occurs in the human body. Students will have
a more comprehensive understanding of what happens in their bodies when they
eat.

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