Teaching about the human body systems and their functions is my absolute NUMBER one favorite topic to teach. I have always been fascinated with the human body, primarily because of how well designed it actually is. We have an amazing creator!
Also, who doesn’t love to talk about themselves? I have always been fascinated with the human body, ever since I read those Charlie Brown encyclopedias. I was only 8-9 years old, and I would sit at home, or be in the car riding with my parents, and I would read these encyclopedias made for kids. My favorite one was one called Your Amazing Body, from your nose to your toes. Ever since that book taught me ALL THE THINGS, I have been obsessed with learning about the human body.
Does anyone remember these Charlie Brown encyclopedias? Surely I’m not the only one who read them!
Systems of the Human Body and their Functions
Usually when teaching the human body system unit, I give an overview of each system and then delve into many individual systems a little more in depth. I think that it’s important to teach all of the body systems first as a quick overview, so when you are talking about each system more in depth, you are able to reference the other systems and how they work so well together to make your body work.
Here are the human body systems that are covered.
- The Integumentary System: protects the body from damage
- The Skeletal System: supports and protects
- The Nervous System: helps parts of the body communicate
- The Circulatory System: transports blood throughout the body
- The Respiratory System: absorbs oxygen, releases carbon dioxide
- The Endocrine System: secretes hormones
- The Muscular System: helps you to move
- The Reproductive System: produces offspring
- The Digestive System: breaks down food
- The Immune System: body’s defense
- The Lymphatic System: sweeps up leaked fluid and fights infections
- The Urinary System: produces, stores, and eliminates fluid waste
- The Excretory System: excretes (gets rid of) waste
After you give the overview of each of the body systems, you can really dive in to learn about individual body systems, and super importantly, how they work with the other systems. Here are some suggestions on how they can be covered depending on your pacing.
- Circulatory and Respiratory Systems
- Digestive, Urinary, and Execratory Systems
- Endocrine and Nervous Systems
- Skeletal and Muscular Systems
How Many Systems are in the Body?
This seems like something that everyone cannot agree on, and this is a great conversation to have in your classroom. Why do some sources talk about the 11 human body systems and their functions, but some sources mention the 8 systems, the 10 systems, or 13 systems? This just shows how closely they all work together, and there are systems within systems.
Personally, I want to teach as many as I can so that I don’t miss anything, and if they hear of these systems anywhere, they will know what they are and how they are a part of the bigger picture, so if you counted above, there are 13. There is no right or wrong answer. As long as students are aware of the major systems, which NGSS seems to believe is the circulatory, excretory, digestive, respiratory, muscular, and nervous systems, any way is fine.
Activities to Teach Human Body Systems and Functions
As mentioned, this is my favorite topic to teach! I have SO many ideas to teach human body systems and there are so many out there on the internet.
WONDER Activities
Wonder activities are hooks that grab students’ attention, getting them excited to learn more about a topic. Here are some things you can try out.
Life-Size Drawings
This is one of the easiest things to do that will get the students excited, and this allows them to learn about the organs of each system. In the past, I’ve done this activity with the respiratory system because it’s a great introduction to understand how we get the essential oxygen in our body and what organs are needed in order to get it. All you have to do is get some bulletin board paper and pull off pieces that are big enough for your students to lay on and trace.
Students can work in groups to trace each other and research and draw the organs that are involved. This works for all of the body systems! Some may be harder than others, but it just depends on what you think is most important for your students to know.
If you don’t think your students have time to draw out the parts of the body system that they are working on, there are printable versions online that your students can glue on.
Here are some examples that I have found.
Making Your Life Sized Body Model Activity
Anatomy Life-Sized Human Paper Model
Weird Human body facts
What cooler way to introduce your students to the human body systems than to tell them a bunch of weird (and maybe gross) facts about the human body. For each one, you can tell your students to stand up if they think it is true and stay seated if they think it’s false. Show them the statements one at a time and give them a few seconds to decide. Feel free to call on a student or two to explain their thinking, but don’t give anything away yet!
After the last slide, hit them with the surprise: every single statement was true. Let that sink in for a second, and then ask what fact surprised them the most.
So, what are some weird human body facts?
- Your mouth produces about one liter of saliva each day.
- You are actually taller in the morning than you are at night.
- Your belly button can be home to over 60 different kinds of bacteria.
I have 20 fun, interesting, and true facts in a presentation inside the Bright in the Middle Membership!
Overcoming Overwhelm with an Interactive Lesson
One of my favorite ways to teach science content is through an interactive lesson. Interactive lessons incorporate the 7 steps to help students retain information, and are a student favorite!
There are so many ways to use them too!
This Human Body System Interactive Lesson gives a great overview of the body systems, the 13 that are mentioned above. It goes over the function, organs, and more!
This is just an overview, but if you are looking to dive into individual systems, check out these interactive lessons:
Circulatory and Respiratory Systems
Digestive and Excretory Systems
A Bonus Way to Teach
This lesson can be used as a review or lesson notes to go over each of the human organ systems. Tired of getting lectures? Gallery walks allow students to get out of their seats and have fun in their learning. Gallery walks allow students to learn at their own pace and allow for the teacher to be the facilitator.
You just need posters that include information about each of the body systems that you want your students to learn and place them about the room. Each student, or students working in pairs, can be given a recording sheet and walk around to fill in a chart.
Because the teacher works as a facilitator in this lesson, it opens up the opportunity to help students that are struggling.
WIDEN Activities
WIDEN Sorts
Categorizing information is a great way to help students understand material better. There are a lot of sorts already available to you such as the Human Body Systems Organs/Parts Sort, the Human Body Systems Vocabulary Matching Cut-n-Glue, and the Human Body Systems Digital Matching Activity.
Dive deeper Into the Body Systems
After you give an overview of the body systems, and you have time to jump into the systems a little deeper, I have you covered. One of the most important things you can do is talk about how the systems work together. Of course, they ALL work together, but some work super closely together and are related. Here are some WOW Factor ideas for teaching the human body systems:
Circulatory and Respiratory Systems
Digestive and Excretory Systems
Want me to share more? Just comment below and let me know what you’d like to see next!
Hands-On Activities
There are so many ideas for hands-on activities for each body system! There are so many resources online and some really awesome activities to give your students hands-on and engaging experience with the body systems. Here are some of my favorites for you to check out!
Working Model Lung – Respiratory System
Bread in a Bag – Digestive System
Edible Skin – Integumentary System
Chicken Wing Dissection – Skeletal and Muscular System
Cover that Skull STEM Activity – Nervous System
Circulatory System Lab – Circulatory System
Immune System Game – Immune System and Lymphatic System
[…] All Human Body Systems […]