Kids may know what lungs are, but they may not understand exactly how they work.
All basic biology classes include instruction about the different systems of the body. Even before students learn about the respiratory system, many students think that they know all about it. They may be surprised to find out several facts about the respiratory system, such as the fact that muscles do not move the lungs, different people have different lung capacities, and aveoli actually transfer oxygen to the bloodstream. You can help them understand these lung respiration facts with these interactive activities.
Lungs Model
You can use this activity to build a model of the respiratory system, which will help students understand how the lungs work. Fill a 16 oz. plastic bottle about halfway with colored water. Then place a straw so that it is sticking out of the bottle, and plug up the area around the straw (at the bottle's neck) with clay. The colored water represents air, the bottle represents the chest, and the straw represents the trachea (windpipe). Have students take turns squeezing the bottle and then letting it go, and discuss how this is similar to the way that air goes in and out of the lungs. Students should understand that the lungs have no muscles, and that the air only goes in and out of them based on the amount of space available in the chest. Discuss the fact that the diaphragm (a large muscle) moves up and down, increasing and decreasing the amount of room in the chest.
Lung Capacity Balloon Activity
This activity will help students understand the terms "capacity" and "circumference," and it will also give them practice with the scientific method. Kids should first guess what factors influence lung capacity the most, such as activity level, height or gender. Kids can then test out their own lung capacities by breathing air into balloons and then measuring the circumference of each balloon. They should take one very deep breath, and then breathe out into the balloon before measuring it. Students can then compare their lung capacities, and try to figure out which factor is most directly related to lung capacity based on their data.
Respiratory System Travel Brochure
Kids can pretend that they work in the advertisement industry and have been hired to design a travel brochure for the respiratory system. They will need to discuss the exciting parts of a trip to the various parts of the respiratory system, some basic background about the action that tourists will see during their trip and some possible dangers that might arise while they are traveling. You can show them fold a paper into thirds to create the shape of a tri-fold brochure (although you may want to use a large piece of tag board or butcher paper instead so that they will have more room to work with). If kids have computer access, they can print out diagrams or pictures of the respiratory system for their brochures.
Tags: respiratory system, lung capacities, that they, about respiratory, about respiratory system, colored water, fact that
