All About Our Heart

   Who does not love to paint? We all love painting! Today, we got extremely excited when we heard that we would have a painting activity but not with a paintbrush! It was a blow painting activity. It appeared so easy to blow into a straw to paint. However, when we tried it, it was a little challenging. After a few tries, we were able to aim right at a spot where we wanted to blow paint into. We thought that it was so cool to see splatters of different patterns and sizes. There were splatters that seem like images to us! It was a thrill to find out what we have created after we blew into the straw.

Our teacher also painted our foot for our portfolio. It was a little ticklish and cold, but we love it! We wonder if our foot will get bigger at the end of the school year.

            After a fun time at Step Park, we headed back to school to continue our circle time. Vieda asked several questions about the heart, and we were able to answer them correctly and quickly!

            She read us a book about our heart and what it does to our body. We listened to our teacher’s heart when she was sitting as well as after she jumped 10 times. Her heartbeat was faster after she jumped! Now, we realized that our heartbeat is affected by what kind of activity we are doing. Does it mean that our heart stops beating when we are sleeping? This was our question of the day and it really made us think. Some of us who answered no explained that the heart must stop beating because we are just sleeping. On the other hand, some of us mentioned that our heart cannot rest so it must be working even when we are asleep.

            During story time, Vieda read us something about our heart. We learned that our heart does not take a rest at all. It works all day and all night to supply blood to all the parts of our body. Wow, we did not realize how hardworking our heart is! If it works that much, we feel that we need to take care of it. And one way of taking care of it is eating healthy food. L said, “My Mommy cooks healthy food all the time!’ Ak on the other hand, emphasized that broccoli is a vegetable which is good for our heart, so his Mommy always puts broccoli in his lunch every day.

            How does the heart pump blood? Unfortunately, we cannot see how our inner body organs work for our body. However, there are things that we can see on the outside that give us clue as to what is happening on the inside! One is when we look at our arms and wrists. We saw lines that to some appear green and to others blue. We now know that these are the special tubes called arteries where our blood pass through. Then, there are spots in our body where we can feel our pulse, which is the rhythm the heart makes when it beats. We touched our neck and our wrist to try to feel our pulse. Some of us could not feel it, while some got excited when they did! Please try to feel your family’s pulse at home.

            Rhythm? We thought only music follows a rhythm, but even our heart has a rhythm! We had a chance to peek through this perfect rhythm the heart and its beating make. Vieda held a ball while we put a red pipe cleaner through a clear straw. To imitate how this heart’s beautiful rhythm, we pushed the pipe cleaner as Vieda squeezed the ball. We slowly pushed the pipe cleaner when Vieda squeezed the ball.  We were quite nervous while doing this activity because we could not just push the pipe cleaner at any time we wanted to. Our heart must have its own intelligent system that coordinates its work! It is truly amazing!

            We have been hearing about lungs since we started talking about our heart. Just before we finished our discussion, we shared some of the questions that we have about lungs.

L: Where are the lungs?

Am: Why is there a slide? (pointing at a picture of the lungs)

Ke: Where are the lungs inside our body?

Yu: Why this side looks like a slide and the other is not?

Ka: Are the lungs for breathing?

A: What do lungs do?

Ak: Does the slide have food inside that goes directly to the lungs?

Am: Maybe the slide is where air comes from?

Ch: Where is the trachea?

Ke: Why are there people inside the lungs (referring to the picture)?

  We are always excited to learn new things about our body. We realized that our body is like a working machine that does not stop working, even when we are asleep! If it works that much, then we need to take care of it!

            We are looking forward to another interesting discovery about our lungs tomorrow! See you all!

Love,

Flowers Class