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d f r You sor s e c pro Written by Claire Wilson, Design by Rachael Somerville Your body, your choice The human body has a number of body systems made up of groups of body parts and organs that perform special jobs. Today we look at the digestive system. Who’s the boss? The choices you make about what you put into your body can affect how well your body systems work. Good digestion helps body organs, including the brain, work properly. You feel good and think clearly. Healthy digestion partly depends on your diet. Good nutrition comes from eating healthy foods including fresh fruit and vegetables, whole grains and protein (eggs, meat, tofu, fish, nuts, etc), and drinking lots of water. Digestive system If you make poor choices you can harm your body. For example: • drugs can affect the way your brain works – scramble messages and make it hard to think clearly and make decisions • smoking can damage your lungs • eating too many lollies can lead to tooth decay • drinking soft drinks can damage your teeth • eating fatty foods and not exercising enough can make you overweight The digestive process begins before you put food into your mouth. Have you noticed your mouth starts to water when you smell something yummy? The moisture is saliva. When you smell and see food, messages are sent to the brain to release saliva in the mouth and to prepare the stomach for food. The digestive system breaks down food into nutrients, which are chemicals the body needs to live and grow. Nutrients are absorbed into the bloodstream. The body then gets rids of the waste it can’t use. The brain controls the way we think, feel, move and behave, and many other things we are not even aware of – like what happens to the food we eat. Messages travel to and from the brain along nerves. The brain is the boss of the nervous system. When a message comes into the brain from anywhere in the body, the brain sends a return message telling the body how to react. For example, when you touch something hot or sharp your brain tells your muscles to jerk away quickly. Body organs work together in groups to do certain jobs. Body systems include the respiratory, digestive, nervous, muscular and circulatory systems. The brain is in charge of all these systems. Create a table showing the good and not so good decisions you have made for your body in the last week. An example been done for you. Write the correct number from the diagram in the circle beside the matching description. • Anything that has not been digested goes into a tube that’s 1.5 metres long and about 7-10 centimetres around. Water and remaining nutrients are absorbed into the body. Leftover waste leaves the body when you go to the toilet. • Muscles squeeze the food down a long stretchy pipe into the stomach. • Stomach muscles break up and mix the food into smaller pieces. Chemicals (enzymes and acid) help to break down the food. • Food fragments go into a 6-7 metre-long tube where it’s broken down further to release nutrients. Nutrients are absorbed into the bloodstream and are carried through the body. Nutrients build and feed the cells, and provide energy to make the body work. • Food enters the body and is broken down by the teeth and saliva into smaller pieces. Good choices Poor choices apples chips What can you say about your choices? Imagine that your body is a machine. Draw it and label each processing stage. For example you might include chopping blades in your machine to break food down. Describe what goes in and what product comes out. Not all stages in the digestive process are included above. Find out what the liver and pancreas do and add the extra steps. Think about your body. How can you tell when you are hungry? Can you feel what happens inside you? Do you go to the toilet regularly? Do you think your digestive system is working well? www.nieonline.co.nz Students, click on KidSpace for online quizzes and activities. Teachers, discover downloadable worksheets, NiE TV videos, teaching suggestions, and loads more! Health news Scientists and health professionals are always learning new things about the effects of what we put into our bodies. The media shares research results and readers have to adjust their understanding about what is good or not so good for them. For example, we used to think that fruit juice was good for the body. We now know it’s very high in sugar and too much can damage children’s teeth. It’s best to eat the whole fruit, which includes fibre, which help keep the digestive system healthy. Search through newspapers and magazines for ads, pictures or news articles of food or drink or other substances that can be taken. Cut them out and sort out them into Good choices and Bad choices. Which appear more frequently? What kinds of choices do you face that affect your health and your lifestyle?