In science: IALT - identify and name the main parts of the human circulatory system, and describe the functions of the heart, blood vessels and blood.

This week in science we watched a heart dissection. Whilst watching it we ticked off all the different parts of the circulatory system that we saw and made notes of their functions. We then took part in a class quiz about blood and drew the circulatory system onto t-shirts - we are going to label the different chambers of the heart on our t shirts and use them to help us remember how our blood is pumped around our body. 

We also did an investigation to see how exercise effects our heart rate. 

We found our pulse by lightly pressing on the skin anywhere there's a large artery running just beneath. Two good places to find it are on the side of your neck and the inside of your wrist, just below the thumb.

We knew when we had found our pulse because we  could feel a small beat under our skin. Each beat is caused by the contraction (squeezing) of your heart. We wanted to find out what our heart rate was so we watched the second hand and counted how many beats you feel in 1 minute. We found that when resting, our heart rate was between 70 and 100 beats per minute.

When we took part in different activities and  ran around a lot, our body needed a lot more oxygen-filled blood. Our heart pumped faster to supply the oxygen-filled blood that our body needed. We could feel our heart pounding in our chest.