The Bone Zone

What To Do

Activities 1, 2, 4 should be done in sequence with participants working in groups of 4-5. Activity 3 is to be done as a group.

Activity Prep

• Pre-cut supplies for Activity 3: Making a Hand and place in labelled bags.
  • Coarse string (~45 cm long, pre-cut into 5 pieces per participant)
  • Straws (cut into 1-1.5cm pieces, 14 pieces per participant), phalanges 
  • Straws (cut into 4.cm pieces, 5 per participant), metacarpals
• Make sample model hands showing the various stages of assembly. 
• Have a hand tracer or pre-photocopied hands available for those who have smaller hands or find tracing and cutting difficult.
• Construct 4 paper hands, 4 cardboard hands and 4 fun foam hands for Activity 4: Testing the Model Hands (if not already available, these should be saved for future workshops). 
• Print copies of the Testing Hand Activity worksheet (1 per participant). 
• Print an extra copy of the “Bone-ified” Fact Sheet to be left with the educator.

Introduction 

• Using the pictures, explain the function of bones: 
  • Bridge- provides support
  • Helmet- provides protection
  • Rollerblades- provides movement.

Activity 1: Support Challenge

• Separate participants into groups of 4-5.
• Discuss the strength of shapes and structures. 
• Give each group a bag containing two toilet paper rolls, a ball of Plasticine and approximately 10 straws.
• Using this material, they will create a structure to support a textbook.
• They will have 5 minutes to complete this challenge. Ask a few groups to share their design with the group. 

Demonstrations 

Paper tube demo

• Show two paper tubes- one with straws inside and one without.
• Ask “which tube is stronger? Why?”.
• Explain the layers of the bone and bone marrow. 
• Ask “why do bones need to be light?”.

Chicken bone demo

• Explain that bones change over time as we grow. 
• Using the tongs, hold up the chicken bones. 
• Show how the bones have become rubbery. Explain why this has happened. 
• Discuss sources of calcium.

Activity 2: Protection Challenges 

• Separate participants into groups of 4-5. 
• Give each group an item to protect and the corresponding task card. 
  • Each group has to protect their item using only a specific body part.
  • They must travel across the classroom protecting their item the entire time. 
  • The item cannot touch the floor or any furniture. 
  • Everyone in the group must participate.
• Explain that it is very important to “protect” the object – not just hold it up. Tell them that you should not be able to come around and take the object away from them. 
• Each group will present their challenge by reading their card and explaining how they protected their object. 
• Discuss how each challenge represents how bones protect organs.

Discussion

• Have participants count the number of bones in their hand (there are 27).
• Explain the relationship between bones, joints, cartilage, muscle, ligaments and tendons using the term cards and the model bone.
  • Refer to pages 14 to 16 of The Bone Zone manual for detailed descriptions of each term. 

Activity 3: Making a Hand

• Hand out materials and put Poster Task Cards and the different stages of model hands on the wall at the front of the classroom.
• To create their hand, each participant will:
  • Trace their hand and wrist on a piece of cardstock and cut it out. Their fingers should be spread out.
  • Tape 3 small pieces of straw (phalanges) to one finger. There should be a small space between the straws. Do not block the ends of the straws with tape. 
  • Repeat for each finger. The thumb only has two phalanges. 
  • Tape 5 long pieces of straw (metacarpals) to the palm of the hand.
  • Take one piece of string and tie a knot in the end.
  • Thread the string through the phalanges and out the metacarpal.
  • Repeat for each finger.
• They should be able to pull the strings at the wrist to make the fingers move.

Activity 4: Testing the Model Hands

• Have a zip-bag of a set of materials and a stack of worksheets and pencils ready for each group to pick up when they are ready to start testing. 
• Each group is to try to pick up objects using their model hand, a paper hand, cardboard hand and fun foam hand.
• After each trial, they are going to rank the level of difficulty to pick up each item (easy, medium or hard) and note it in their worksheet.

Wrap-Up

• Review the three main functions of bones (support, protect and movement). 
• Discuss possible careers related to the topics covered and what they would need to do (schooling, experience, etc…) to get into those careers.