Where does all that food go?

The children will learn about the human digestive system. They will be introduced to the main body parts associated with the digestive system; the mouth, tongue, teeth, oesophagus, stomach, intestines, rectum and anus. They will learn that the role of the digestive system is to break down the food we eat so that the nutrients, energy and other requirements we derive from it can be used in the rest of the body.
They will then learn about how food can be broken down through mechanical and chemical processes. They will then find out in more detail about the roles of the different types of teeth in breaking food down, and how to care for their teeth. 

When working scientifically children will ask and answer questions about teeth and digestion by carrying out research using secondary sources. They will group and classify teeth by their function and relate this to diet. They will have opportunities to carry out comparative and fair tests on different types of toothpaste and to record and present data in a range of ways.

Challenge Time

Today's challenge was to work together as a team to try to place the piece of the digestive system into the correct places on our body pictures! We had lots of fun learning how to say the names of the different parts of the digestive system and trying to work out the order in which the food travels through them as it makes its way through our bodies. Lots of discussion and teamwork later, we arrived at our finished ideas! We then checked and found out if we were correct or if we needed to move any parts!

The Mouth

This week we learnt about what happens to food in our mouth's.  We looked in mirrors and identified the different teeth that we have.  

Functions of Teeth

This week we thought about the functions of teeth!  We started our lesson by discussing which child we agreed or disagreed with on the concept cartoon. 

We tried eating different foods and thought about which of our teeth we were using as we ate.  We found that we used different teeth for different purposes.  

Function of the digestive system

This week we learnt about the functions of the different parts of the digestive system.

First we cut up the food (incisors) before grinding it using our molars.  We added a small amount of saliva too!

Next we poured our food through our oesophagus and into our stomach. Once in the stomach we added acid and churned the mixture over and over.

After being in our stomach, the mixture moved into the small intestine. In the small intestine nutrients were taken out into the blood stream.  Next the food moved into the large intestine where the excess fluid was removed.

Finally our food mixture had turned into waste and it moved into the rectum and out of the anus!