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A Heart Pumping Adventure

A heart pumping adventure

Today we are reviewing the third title in the Human Body Detective (HBD) series by Dr Heather Manley.

During their first trip Merrin and Pearl visited the Digestive system.  It the 2nd book, they went through the Immune system. Today’s title is ‘A heart Pumping Adventure’.  Merrin is reading about the Heart in her science book and becomes concerned about her Dad’s health. Suddenly, she and her sister Pearl are traveling down a rushing red ‘river’ on something that looks like a red ‘doughnut’.   The human body detectives need to figure out what they need to do to help their father…

The Circulatory system is the focus of this title. The illustrations and storyline are educational, but fun enough to distract kids if they are queasy about blood. Our 7 year old loved the icky-ness of Digestion and Mucus (in the previous titles) but she doesn’t like anything to do with blood. She did, however, enjoy this book and loved the jokes at the end. The characters and themes in these books are definitely sending a positive message to kids. I really like the two sisters in the apps, who love science and make healthy choices. heart bumping adventure app

Readers will learn:

  • What makes up the Circulatory system
  • The important role each part of this system plays to make sure our whole body gets the oxygen and nutrients it needs.
  • What the Heart looks like and what can happen if we don’t take care of ourselves.
  • How to boost your diet with Fiber filled foods to keep your blood vessels clean.
  • How to take your Pulse.

To take our learning ‘beyond the app’, we made a simple model of the blood using Water , Cherrios and Marshmallows . Water represented the plasma. We added a lot of ‘Plasma’ because it makes up over half of our Blood’s volume. I also explained that real Plasma is a lot thicker than water as it contains other things like Protein, Carbohydrates, Fats and Antibodies.

The marshmallows were the white blood cells we learned about in ‘Battle of the bugs’. Cherrios gave the kids a good idea of the shape of a red blood cell. We painted the cheerios with red paint to show the Hemoglobin they produce, and that gives red blood cells their color. We recalled from this app that the red blood cells transport oxygen and carbon dioxide separately on this Hemoglobin. The reason blood is red is because of the huge numbers of Red Blood Cells in our blood.

This was the result….a somewhat gross looking jar of ‘blood’. It was a memorable demonstration!

Demonstration showing what Blood is made up of

I would recommend all three apps as a way to teach 6-12 year olds about how their bodies work and what they can do to stay healthy with good nutrition choices. In addition to the app, The Human Body Detectives series also has a  website and curriculum. We will share our experience of the curriculum in our next post.

The curriculum has a lot great suggestion on learning activities that go with the apps.  If you are interested in doing science activities with your kids, make sure come read the next review on the curriculum.  We have a great deal from Dr. Heather Manley, specially for iGameMom readers.  Don’t miss it.

A Heart Pumping Adventure works on iPhone, iPod and iPAD. It is $1.99 on App Store. There is a HD version that only works on iPAD, which is $2.99. The App Store link below leads to the one of $1.99.

If you would like to check it out or purchase it, please use the App Store link provided below. The cost is the same to you, but iGameMom gets a small percentage. Thanks for your support! Note: The link works for all countries.
A Heart Pumping Adventure - PicPocket Books

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Piwi mamaToday’s app is reviewed by JJ (Piwi mama), a proud wife and mama of two girls. The family travel with her hubby’s work so most of her time is spent teaching her kids. In her spare time, JJ blogs about their portable learning and reviews books. You can read about their travels at Learning and Growing the Piwi way

{ 4 comments… add one }
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