- Build your model of the heart
and circulatory system
- Enter you pictures and
instructions
- Win a free lab visit for your
class
- Runner up
prizes of a games consol and Amazon vouchers
The British Heart Foundation BHF is the single biggest independent
funder of heart research in the UK. But now our scientists need
your support!
Your Mission
Design a model of the heart showing
how it pumps blood around the body.
The model judged the best will be turned into a kit by the BHF that
schools and youth clubs around the country can use to learn more
about the heart.
The pupils who make the winning model
will get £25 Amazon shopping vouchers each and be
invited to bring their class to visit a working
laboratory where they will see real heart research.
There will be a runner-up prize for one
team of a Wii games console for their
school.
The rules
Your heart is a pump that makes sure
blood travels around your body and this movement of blood is called
circulation. Thanks to the heart, blood can travel to every part of
the body before returning to it. Your model doesn’t need to
be so realistic that it looks like the real thing, but it should
demonstrate these key features:
PUMPING – Your heart is
a pump that keeps blood moving around your body. It delivers oxygen
and nutrients to all parts of your body, and carries away unwanted
carbon dioxide and waste products.
Did you know? Your heart
has to work really hard – your heart can’t have a rest or go on
holiday. It works so hard that over 50 years the heart beats nearly
two billion times!
NARROWING – A heart
pumps lots of blood around the body but it needs blood too so it
can keep pumping. The arteries that supply the heart muscle with
blood can gradually become narrowed by a build-up of fatty material
on their walls. Blood can’t get through these narrowed arteries so
easily so the heart has to work harder.
Did you know? Red blood
cells in our blood carry the oxygen. After being pumped out of the
heart it takes just 20 seconds for a red blood cell to go round the
body and back to the heart.
Bonus feature
STICKINESS - Your blood is thick and a bit sticky. It’s
made up of lots of tiny cells with different specialist jobs. One
type of cells is called a platelet – they are even smaller than red
blood cells and they help clot the blood so they help stop the
bleeding if you cut yourself.
Did you know? About 8
per cent of your whole body weight is just your blood. The average
grown-up has about 5 litres of it in their body – that’s the same
as just over 15 normal cans of a fizzy drink.
The materials
ANYTHING - as long as the items can
be found easily, are safe to use and cheap to buy, Blue Peter
style! For example some clear plastic tubing could act as a blood
vessel or a squeezy bottle could be the heart that is squeezed to
send your fake blood around your model of circulation.
You can enter in groups of up to 10 but
you need to be between the ages of 11 and 18. Your heart model
needs to be something that 11-14 year olds can make from normal
household materials.
What to send us
Once you’ve made your model, please do
the following to enter our competition
Put together a set of clear and
simple instructions, including a list of materials, with
plenty of diagrams (no longer than two sides of A4 paper) that
shows us how you made your model. It might be a good idea to keep
track of what you do as you make the model!
Take three to five pictures of
your model or make a basic video of it and upload it to
YouTube.
Post or email us your pictures or
a link to the video, as well as the instructions.
Please send your entries by email to:
yheart@bhf.org.uk or post them to:
Build-a-heart
British Heart Foundation
Greater London House
180 Hampstead Road
London
NW1 7AW
The closing date is 30th November
2012.
Competition T&C's