UNIT 1 OUR BODY

PARTS OF THE BODY

We make many different movements through the day. Our muscles and bones work together to move our body.

Bones are high and rigid. We cannot bend our bones.

Muscles are soft and flexible. Many muscles are joined to bones. When muscles move, they push and pull the bones.

A voluntary movement is when we make a movement that we want to, for example, when we pick up a glass.

An involuntary movement is one that we do not control. For example, we touch something hot, and then take our hand out quickly.

THE SKELETON

The skeleton is made up of all the bones in our body. The skeleton has two important functions:

- It holds the body up. It gives it shape.- It protects the most delicate parts of the body like the

brain, the heart and the lungs.

The parts of the skeleton:

Bones are hard and rigid. They are different in shape and size. For example, the bones in our fingers are small and short. The bones in our legs are big and long.

Cartilage is soft and flexible. We have cartilage at the end of some of our bones, for example, our nose.

The joints

A joint is a place where two bones meet. Some bones are joined together so closely that they cannot move, for example the bones in the skull. Other bones have a special

joint which means they can move. Our joints are important for movement.

The neck is the joint between the head ant the trunk.

The shoulder, elbow and wrist are the joints in our arms.

The hip, knee and ankle are the joints in our legs.

MUSCLES

We need muscles in order to move.

Type of muscles

We divide muscles into two groups:

We move our voluntary muscles when we want to. The muscles in our arms are voluntary muscles.

The involuntary muscles move by themselves. We do not control their movement. For example, the heart is a muscle. It moves all the time.