Whalsay Primary 3/4

Our topic this term is all about ‘The Body’ We have been learning about our skeleton and the functions of some of our organs. This week we focused on the digestive system. We discovered that the mouth is the first part of the ‘food journey’ through our bodies, and we  learned about the jobs our teeth and tongue have. Next we looked at how we swallow food and where it goes – the stomach, then into the small intestine and large intestine – taking all the nutrients we need before the bits we don’t need  exit the body.

We then carried out a practical experiment showing the digestive system ‘in action’ using a plastic bag to represent the stomach, the leg of a pair of tights to represent the intestines and a large tray to represent our bodies. Firstly we had the mulch up crackers and a banana in our plastic ‘stomach’ adding orange juice (stomach acid) and some water (saliva). Once the food had been turned into ‘soup’ we poured it into our ‘intestine’ – the ‘nutrients’ came through the wall of the ‘intestine’ into our bodies, and the waste was squeezed out of the bottom to show what happens when the bits we don’t need exit the body. The experiment was a lot of fun and VERY messy.