Learning about the skeletal system

The kids and I have decided to study the human body systems this year for our science lesson.  We have been doing lots of learning about the skeletal system by reading, watching videos and doing lots of activities.

Several years ago I purchased a set of X-rays off Amazon after reading about it on another blog, sorry I can't remember whose blog that was:(

We took the x-rays out and began to assemble the skeleton

some X-rays overlapped and it was a bit of a struggle for the kids to figure out  left vs right side of the x-rays but we did figure it out 

Next we went thru and labeled the parts of the skeleton

The kids like it so much they decided BOB needed to remain up until after Halloween:)

Next we got out our microscope and examined a dog skeleton bone.  The kids drew a picture of what they saw

We learned about the layers of the bone and then made a bone model based on what we learned

First we created the Periosteum which is a very thin layer and on this layer you can find blood vessels and nerves.  The kids used green yarn for nerves, red yarn for oxygenated blood and blue yarn for veinous blood  I did explained to the children the blood vessels moved throughout all layers of the bone

We used pool noodle to represent the spongy bone called trabecular.  We used PVC pipe to represent the  compact  or cortex bone

Next we used modeling clay and red yarn to make the bone marrow

we added a gray pipe to represent the medullary cavity that hold the bone marrow

added the bone marrow 

our completed bone model with all the parts of the bone

Next I got a small meat bone from the grocery store and had the kids examine it  closely

We looked at the compact bone, the spongy bone and the Periosteum.  Using a magnifying glass the kids could examine each part more closely

The kids decided to dissect the bone marrow but decided to use knives and forks because it was so squishy:)

Luna appreciated this science as she got the bones to chew on after the kids were done examining them:)

Lastly I got out a skeleton model I bought years ago and we read thru the booklet 

and assembled it.  As you can see the kids struggled to get some of the smaller pieces put together

Success -- we reviewed the bones and the movement of the joints which is what we are need studying:)

We are now moving on to learn about the different joints of the body and identify where they can be found and what movement they can do:)  More activities to come soon.