Body Systems: Cardiovascular System: Heart Mambo

You'll need to do a bit of prep work on this one, but it's a great learning tool, especially for your kinesthetic learners.

This activity originally comes from Janet Guadino and was shared at the 2007 Maitland Simmons Life Science Institute.


You'll need to make a series of signs for the floor. Use as many 'parts' as is appropriate for your students.  I've chose not to include the valves, but they are included in the list, parenthetically.

Blue Signs (written in blue or on blue paper)
Right Atrium
Right Ventricle(Tricuspid A.V. Valve)
(Pulmonary Semilunar Valve)
Pulmonary Trunk Artery
Veins
Veins
Vena Cava
Arrow (x12)

Red Signs (Written in red or on red paper)
Pulmonary Vein
Left Atrium
Left Ventricle
(Aortic Semilunar Valve) 
(Bicuspid/Mitral A.V. Valve)
Aorta
Arteries
Arteries
Arrow (x9)


Red and Blue Signs
Capillaries
Capillaries

Neutral Colored
Lungs

Arrange the cards on the floor as shown below (this is a condensed view, so they'll fit in one picture; you'll obviously want them spread apart so the path can be walked along):

In case you can't make it out from those shadowy pictures, the order of the signs is...

Lungs/Capillaries
Pulmonary Vein
Left Atrium
Left Ventricle
Aorta
Arteries
Capillaries
Veins
Vena Cava
Right Atrium
Right Ventricle
Pulmonary Artery
And back to the lungs


Have the students form a conga line behind you and lead them through the heart.  As you're traveling, chant "We're goin' through the heart, yeah!" Feel free to add some conga motions as well.  Pause at each location and call out where you're at/what you're doing. 

To close out the activity, have students place the following steps in order.  There is no right or wrong step to begin with, as it's a cycle, it's the order in which they appear that matters.  (I've written them in order for you, but you'd obviously mix them up before handing them to your students):

1 - Oxygen poor blood flows from the body into the right atrium

2 - The blood flows from the right atrium to the right ventricle

3 - The right ventricle pumps blood into the arteries that lead to the lungs

4 - In the lungs the blood picks up the oxygen and leaves carbon dioxide

5 - Oxygen rich blood leaves the lungs and enters the left atrium

6 - Blood flows from the left atrium into the left ventricle

7 - oxygen rich blood leaves the left ventricle and enters the aorta

8 - The aorta carries the oxygen rich blood to the rest of the body