Welcome back to Science Saturdays! The Homeschool Scientist and MeetPenny.com are back from our Christmas break and back to studying Human Anatomy and Physiology with curriculum from Apologia. This week, we are studying lesson 7 – Life In The Blood.
Just the idea of studying blood can make most people queasy. This week, we tried to focus on the important role of blood to our bodies with different hands-on activities to take some of the gross factor out.
DIY Blood
One activity my daughter’s co-op class did this week was to make their own fake blood. OK. I admit. This does sound pretty gross, but the kids loved it! Here a pretty life-like fake blood recipe you can try at home.
- 1 cup corn syrup
- Red fruit punch
- 2 tablespoons of red food coloring
- 1 tablespoon of chocolate syrup
- 1 tablespoon of powdered cocoa
- 2 tablespoons of cornstarch
Combine all of the ingredients in a blender and mix for 10-15 seconds. Take out some blood on a spoon or on a white towel to check the color and thickness. Adjust your ingredients as needed. Remember the corn syrup adds thickness and the cornstarch makes the blood not so transparent. The chocolate syrup and cocoa make the blood darker.
DIY Blood Model
Looking at blood, it just looks like simple red goo. The truth is that blood is very complex and is made of lots of different components. You can make a model of the major components of blood in your kitchen. Use these supplies to represent different parts of the blood.
- Karo Syrup – plasma
- Lima Beans – white blood cells
- Red Candies – red blood cells
- Lentils – platelets
Pour all ingredients into a clear glass jar. Our photos didn’t turn out, but Creekside Learning did a great job on this project. Check out their link for some other blood study ideas, also.
Great model of blood contents from CreeksideLearning.com
Blood Study Resources
Here are some other blood study resources we found to be helpful:
Online interactive blood lesson
Human Blood Lesson You Tube Video
White blood cell chasing a bacteria
Oxygen transport via hemoglobin
Don’t forget to visit MeetPenny.com to see how her crew studied blood this week. See you next week as we study the Circulatory System.
I was looking at the model of blood picture thinking it looked familiar, and then I saw the caption, that’s why it’s familiar. I’ve pinned it before.
Julie at Creekside Learning took such a better picture of her blood model than I did and was sweet enough to let me use it. She has such great hands on science ideas!
Love that blood model. Definitely have to try the fake blood–these are great activities for a co-op. Thanks for posting!