Grade Level 3-5 Activity Summary: Energize! Students will discover ther relationship between metabolism and the energy we get from food, by growing yeast cultures in pop bottles with varying amounts of sugar. Students will also be introduced to CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES the various kinds of common sugars and the importance of eating healthily. Time 20-30 minutes Activity Summary: A perfect fit! Students will explore the role of shape- matching in every process of the immune system using salt-dough clay. Time 30-40 minutes Activity Summary: You Make Me Sick! In this immunology board game, students will gain understanding about the immune system, basic transmission and common diseases. Time 30-40 minutes THE IMMUNE SYSTEM Full educational standards available Teacher at www.sepa.duq.edu/education Pages ContentDesigners Developers Brianne Miller, Gerra Molly Bosco Bugaile and Brianne Miller Keywords I antibiotics- Kill bacteria in esson Preparation MMUNE our bodies. L Dear Educator, M antibodies - Special particles ODULE that stick to toxins, bacteria This workbook contains 3 activities to help your students learn about how the and viruses. They tell the immune system fights disease and keeps us healthy. The first activity, Energized!, T - EACHER immune system to get rid of allows your students to explore how the food we eat provides energy for us to live. the germs or toxins. The second activity, A Perfect Fit!, uses salt-dough to demonstrate how our white bacteria - Bacteria are single- blood cells recognize germs using 3D shapes. The third activity, You Make Me Sick!, celled organisms that can be is a board game that allows your students to fight disease with their knowledge of good or bad. Our immune the immune system. system fights off the bad 2 ones. The Immune System B cells - See white blood cells. Our body’s immune system protects us from germs like viruses, bacteria, fungal cell - All living things are infections and parasites. Our immune system is made up of special organs, vessels made of cells. Living things and many different types of unique cells that each play a very important role in can be made up of only keeping us healthy. We call the cells of the immune system white blood cells. one cell - like bacteria - or There are four major types of white blood cells: T cells, B cells, Neutrophils and billions and billions of cells Macrophage. like human beings. There are many different kinds of cells: hair cells, skin cells, plant Macrophage (mack’-row-fage; from the Latin macro = cells, etc. big, phage = eat) are white blood cells that eat germs that have been covered by antibodies. Their job is to contagious - When a disease patrol the body looking for germs. When they find an can be easily spread from one person to another person, it is infection, they send a signal to our T cells, and our T cells contagious. send the other white blood cells to the infection. disinfectant - Chemicals that Neutrophils (new’-tro-fills) are the white blood cells that kill germs on the outside of are the “first responders” to infections. We have more your body, like soap. neutrophils than any other type of white blood cell. germ - An organism that T cells are the most important white blood cell; they infects our bodies and makes coordinate the activities of all of the other white blood us sick (causes disease). The cells and are essential for fighting disease. There are two two most common types major types of T cells: Helper T cells (T ) and Killer T cells of germs are bacteria and H (T ). Helper T cells send signals that activate the rest of viruses. K your immune system to fight a germ. Killer T cells patrol immune system - Tissues, the body and eliminate infected cells. cells and organs that detect and fight infections caused B cells also play an important role in protecting our by germs. bodies; they produce and release special proteins called antibodies. Antibodies stick to the surface of immunity - When your immune system knows what germs in our bodies, thus disabling them and also a certain germ looks like, they making them a target for another type of cell called can get rid of it without you macrophage. Each B cell and its antibodies can only getting sick. You are immune recognize one kind of germ. Antibodies will only stick to that germ. to germs, except in rare cases of autoimmune diseases infection- When a germ where the antibodies mistake our own healthy cells for enters our bodies and makes invaders. us sick. macrophage - See white The Immune System blood cells. I MMUNE memory - Your immune What DOES IT DO? system can remember what Your immune system remembers! “Memory” T and B cells can remember all the M a germ looks like after it has germs they’ve found…for your whole life! This way, if that germ comes back your ODULE been exposed to it. This way, body can get rid of it very quickly! This is why you can only get sick from a disease T - you don’t get sick from the same thing twice. one time (like Chicken Pox). You might be thinking, “But I’ve had lots of colds!” The EACHER “common cold” is actually caused by many different types of viruses that all cause neutrophil - See white blood the same symptoms, which is why you can “catch a cold” more than once. Because cells. there are so many types of viruses that cause the common cold, there is no vaccine organism - A living thing. for the common cold. Plants, animals and bacteria are organisms. A rock is not 3 an organism because it is not alive. T cells - See white blood cells. Vaccines work by showing your body what a single germ looks like – like a “Most Wanted” toxins - Toxins are poisons sign. They help your immune system learn what that make us sick. Some bacteria release toxins in our a particular germ looks like, so it doesn’t make body. you sick. The vaccine helps your B cells produce antibodies against that germ and become The Flu vaccines works viruses - Viruses are usually Memory B cells that will remember that germ. smaller than a cell and cannot like a “Most Wanted“ sign, live on their own. They need This is how vaccines give you immunity. to infect another organism showing the immune cells and live in its cells. what the flu bacteria looks white blood cells - There are many different kinds of like! immune cells; T cells and B Metabolism and the Immune System cells are the white blood cells that do most of the fighting Our bodies need lots of energy to live our day to day lives. We need energy to against germs. Here are some power our immune system and to do everything from reading, running…even examples of white blood cells: sleeping and eating! All of the processes in your body that involve getting or spending energy are known as metabolism. A high metabolism occurs when neutrophils are the “first responders” to infections. your body is both getting a lot of energy and using a lot of energy, whereas a low They can call other immune metabolism occurs when the body does not have a sufficient quantity of energy to cells when they find an use. Our bodies get energy from food. A healthy diet is one that supplies our bodies infection. with a balanced amount of sugars, fats, proteins, vitamins and all other nutrients we need to function properly. macrophages can “eat” germs or infected cells. B cells can also eat germs but they make antibodies which are special flags that stick to the germs and help the body get rid of them. See and do more with the immune system online! T cells have many functions Learn more about the Immune System online at: but, in particular, they can http://www.sepa.duq.edu/regmed/immune activate other immune cells, like B cells, to help fight disease. They can also directly kill infected cells. I Immune System Activity I: MMUNE M Energize! ODULE - T - our body needs a great deal of energy to help you complete your EACHER day-to-day activities, such as doing homework, playing soccer, or Y P even reading a book! For any of these activities, even when you’re just AGES sleeping, all of your cells need energy to continue being healthy. So, your body is constantly busy getting energy by eating food, storing the food energy (calories), and then spending it. All of the processes in your body 4 that involve getting or spending energy are known as your metabolism. A high metabolism occurs when your body uses energy, whereas a low metabolism occurs when the body does not have a sufficient quantity of energy to use. o where does your body get all of this energy from? Well, eating a Shealthy diet helps to provide your body with a great deal of its energy. Have you ever heard of The food you eat is broken down into smaller parts like sugars, fats, the pancreas? It’s a cone proteins, and other nutrients in a process called digestion. The broken- down nutrients are absorbed by the body, mostly in your intestine, and shaped little organ that are then transported to every cell and tissue in your body with the help sits under your liver. of your blood vessels. A special chemical helps cells absorb sugar from the blood stream – it is called insulin. Sugar is one of the main sources Your pancreas is very of energy for the body so without insulin, most of the cells in your body important in the process would starve! of getting energy for ur body uses chemicals like insulin to carefully regulate the amount your body.