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Simon Says, "Touch Your Femur"

Subjects

• Health
• Physical Education
• Science

Grade

• PreK
• K-2
• 3-5
• 6-8
• 9-12

Brief Description

Adapt the popular children's game with such directives as "Simon says shake your phalanges."

Objectives

Students display their new knowledge of human body parts -- their names and locations -- by playing an adaptation of the game Simon Says. You can use a more sophisticated version of the game with older students; even high school students will enjoy the game as they are asked to follow directions such as "Simon says use your right finger to touch your femur." (The activity includes some sample directions from Simon.)

Keywords

game, human body, biology

Materials Needed

N/A

Lesson Plan

Adapt the game of Simon Says for use as part of a unit on the human body. Include the names and locations of body parts (outside or inside) and their locations as students learn them. Below is a sampling of some of the commands that might be more appropriate for teachers in upper elementary grades and above. Students who don't follow Simon's commands correctly or who follow a command not preceded by "Simon says" are out of the game. Following are some sample directions.

Simon says

• point to the location of your liver.
• open the orifice (mouth) nearest your salivary glands.
• move your mandible (jaw) back and forth.
• wiggle your phalanges (fingers and toes).
• touch your tibia (shinbone).
• put your right hand on your ilium (hip).
• pound your sternum (chest).
• touch your cranium (skull) with your left hand.
• put your hands on your femurs (thighs).
• touch your chin to your right clavicle (shoulder).
• point to your cerebrum (brain.).
• close an oculus (eye).
• raise your left supercilium (eyebrow).
• lift one patella (kneecap) to your chest.
• point to your umbilicus (navel).
• bend your right carpus (wrist).

Give students a quiz in which students match scientific body part names to common names.

Assessment

Evaluate students' quiz grades.

Lesson Plan Source

Education World

Submitted By

Gary Hopkins

National Standards

Health:
NPH-H.K-4.1
NPH-H.5-8.1
NPH-H.9-12.1

Physical Education:
NPH.K-12.2

Science:
NS.K-4.6
NS.5-8.3
NS.9-12.3