Questions
to ask:
Did you and your partner have the same heartbeats per minute?
What did you notice about your heartbeat after you exercised? Why
do you think your heartbeat increased?
Activity
2: Muscles and Movement- Let’s Play Tag!
In this exercise, we will learn the names and locations of
major muscles in the body.
The main function of muscles is to provide movement. Muscles provide
coordination and structure for the body.
It takes a lot of work for muscles to pull on bones so that you
can move. Along with muscles and joints, bones are responsible for
you being able to move. Your muscles are attached to bones. When
muscles contract, the bones to which they are attached act as levers
and cause various body parts to move.
This simple activity will teach the girls the basic muscle groups
with word association. As you say the name of the muscle group,
point to where the muscle are located on your body. Here are some
muscle groups, their definitions, and the words used to help remember
them:
Trapezius -- The
muscle that "traps" your head onto your shoulders. (large
flat triangular superficial muscle of each side of the upper back)
Deltoids -- The airplane muscles.
Have the girls put their arms out like an airplane. Then they remember
DELTA AIRLINES.
(a large triangular muscle that covers the shoulder joint and serves
to raise the arm laterally)
Abdominals
-- These are our DOMINOS PIZZA muscles. Students remember this is
where the Dominos Pizza goes.
(the part of the body between the thorax and the pelvis)
Obliques
-- These are the muscles where the girls put their hands on their
waist and say "OH BOY, that pizza was good."
(any of the thin flat muscles forming the middle and outer layers
of the lateral walls of the abdomen)
Gluteus
Maximus -- The girls remember this with the phrase, "Glue
your bottoms to your seat." (the outermost muscle of the three
glutei found in each of the human buttocks)
Gastrocnemius
-- This is the place where your legs store the GAS to run faster.
(the largest and most superficial muscle of the calf of the leg
arising by two heads from the condyles of the femur and attaching
to a tendon that becomes part of the Achilles tendon)
Biceps--
These muscles help you to ride a BICYCLE.
(the large flexor muscle of the front of the upper arm and the large
flexor muscle of the back of the upper leg)
Triceps-
these muscles help you to ride a TRICYCLE. (the great extensor muscle
along the back of the upper arm)
Ask the girls to go through the rest of the major muscles and
come up with interesting and unique associations to help learn
them more easily and remember them.
Let’s Play Tag!
If your group is able to go outside or has access to an
auditorium, this activity is a great was to reinforce the location
of the muscles in the body.
This game will work best after the girls have been taught several
of the muscles of the body.
Have all the girls get a small ball and ask them to find a good
space in the playing area. On your signal, the girls are to walk
and try to tag anyone and everyone in the area until you tell
them to stop. When tagged, the girls are to freeze, touch a muscle
on their body that has been discussed in class (i.e., abdominals,
biceps, triceps, etc.) with their ball. Then they are to wait
for a classmate, who has not been tagged, to come over and guess
which muscle they are touching. If she identifies the correct
muscle, then the frozen girl is allowed to continue playing. If
she guesses incorrectly, then she has to wait for another girl
to come by and identify the muscle correctly. Start the girls
off by having them walk, then change to a faster walk or skipping.
Be sure to limit the time for tagging, perhaps to 30 second increments,
so that each girl gets a chance to tag and be tagged during the
course of this activity.
Questions to ask:
Ask the girls to name a major muscle in the human body.
Ask the girls to show where the muscle is located and to explain
its function. Why are muscles important?
Activity 3: Our Bones
In this exercise, we will learn that the human body has
a skeleton, united by joints that is ready for action. The structure
of a bone is related to its function.
A human body can move in many ways. Movements are aided and limited
by bone and point structures. Bones have a variety of forms and
have three major functions-support, protection and locomotion.
What would happen if you didn't have bones? You would be floppy
like a rag doll. Bones have two purposes. Some, like your spine,
provide the structure, which enables you to stand tall instead
of being floppy. Other bones protect the delicate, and sometimes
soft, insides of your body. Your skull, a series of fused bones,
acts like a hard helmet for your brain so that is protected. Your
rib cage protects your heart and lungs. The bones, or vertebrae,
of your spinal column surround and protect your spinal cord.
You also need joints. which provide flexible connections between
these bones. Your body has different kinds of joints. Some, such
as those in your knees, work like door hinges, enabling you to
move back and forth. Those in your neck enable bones to pivot
so you can turn your head. Still other joints like the shoulder
enable you to move your arms 360 degrees like a showerhead. You
have over 230 working joints in your body!
When you are born, you had over 300 bones. As you grow, some of
these bones began to fuse together. The result is that as an adult,
you have only 206 bones!
This activity will help the girls learn bones of the body using
fun and active visual and auditory cues. As you say the name of
the bone, be sure to point to it on your own body. There are many
bones and you can come up with your own cues for each of them.
Here are some examples:
Phalanges – have the
girls wiggle their fingers in the air
(small bones in the fingers or toes of land vertebraes)
Radius - show the "thumbs
up" (the bone on the thumb side of the human forearm)
Vertebrae - Say "bend
this way." (one of the bony or cartilaginous segments composing
the spinal column)
Ribs - Place hands on the ribs
and take a big breath (any of the paired curved bony or partly
cartilaginous rods that stiffen the walls of the body of most
vertebrates and protect the viscera)
Patella - Say "Knees"
and put hands on patella. (a thick flat triangular movable bone
that forms the anterior point of the knee and protects the front
of the joint)
Metacarpals - Clap out a beat
(a bone of the part of the hand or forefoot between the carpus
and the phalanges that typically contains five more or less elongated
bones when all the digits are present)
Metatarsals - Stomp out a beat
(any of several tubular bones between the ankle (tarsal) bones
and each of the hindlimb digits)
Femur - Say and place hands
on femur, "I've got the femur!"
(the proximal bone of the hind or lower limb -- called also thighbone)
Carpals - Say, "yes"
using sign language (carpal element or bone)
Pelvis - Say, "Wiggle
it just a little bit." (a basin-shaped structure in the skeleton
of many vertebrates that is formed by the pelvic girdle and adjoining
bones of the spine)
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