Life Cycle - Human Biology (KB)
Pre Lab 

   
OBJECTIVES:
  • Exploring the skeletal system. 
  • Discovering why bones are important. 
VOCABULARY:
  • backbone
  • finger
  • foot
  • jaw
  • lower leg
  • pelvis
  • skull
  • tail bone
  • upper leg
  • wrist
MATERIALS:

Students discover that humans have an internal skeleton.

 

BACKGROUND:

The skeleton allows humans to stand, sit, run, roll, walk, and perform almost every other motion.  It gives our body the strength to stand up and if we did not have a skeleton, we would be like a jellyfish, or just a glob of jelly. 

Students have seen skeletons but many of them do not realize how it relates to their own body. They are not sure if there is one big bone or many little ones.  They don’t realize how they stay connected, many believe that we are glued together.

PROCEDURE:
  1.  Read the recommended animated poem, Human Bone Poem.     It can help you introduce the human skeleton to your students.  Go over some of the words with the students after you read the bone (articulate, fuse, groove, marrow, blood, appendage) and see if the animation helped them determine what that word means.   Repeat the poem several times. 
      
  2. Ask students if their bones are hard or soft.  To prove to them that bones are hard, have them knock their clenched fists together at the knuckles.  They can hear a strong tap which is the sound of bones.  If you have any bones, make a display so students can see what bones look like.
      
  3. Give each child a ball of clay and ask them to make a figure of a person.  After they make the figure, ask them if the figure has a skeleton.  Many will say yes.  Well, if the figure had a skeleton and you tried to squash the figure it should not have flattened.  Have the students determine for themselves if the figure has a skeleton.  Since the figure can be squashed, it has no skeleton.     
      
  4. Ask your doctor if he or she can “donate” an x-ray from their medical files.  It is amazing to students to see that we can actually “see” through our skin.

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