Sunday 5 April 2015

Human Anatomy-Skin


We've been learning all about the largest human organ.  That's right the skin!  It really is fascinating how important this organ is.  
L started off by watching this video on the skin from Youtube.  I can't stand this series but L thinks they are hilarious.
I found this fun experiment that measures how sensitive different areas of our skin are.  L used invisible thread, embroidery thread and yarn on different parts of her participants bodies such as the cheek, elbow and palm of the hand.  She had the subject close their eyes and she gently touched the tip of the invisible thread to the part of the skin.  If the subject didn't feel anything she would move on to the embroidery thread and then the yarn.  L recorded her results in the following chart.
This was a fun experiment to show how different parts of our skin are more sensitive than others and we talked about why that might be.

Next L did the super fun and gross experiment of covering her whole hand in white craft glue.  After waiting for it to dry she slowly peeled it off.  It just happened to be April Fool's Day so she played a gruesome trick on her granny.  The next day L examined the fake skin under the microscope and we talked about how each person has unique finger prints and how they can be used for identification.

Then it was time to make a model of her own.  I printed off a diagram of the layers of the human skin for L and she had tons of fun making this human skin model out of a sponge, felt and embroidery thread.