Have a Heart
Sheep hearts are amazing! Their similarity to the human heart makes them an invaluable learning tool for our study of the human body. The chambers and vessels in and out of the heart are just like ours. I get one classroom heart in the pericardium sac because it is covered with fat. This is a powerful visual for the students to show them that even though someone might have a healthy diet (sheep are vegetarians after all), without exercise fat can build up throughout the entire body, even on the heart. The hearts that are not in the pericardium still have quite a bit of fat build-up on the outside but we can cut into the chambers of these to see what is going on inside the heart. We see the inside of the vessels, chambers and the valves. The valves are tissue-paper thin yet they make the loud “lub-dub” sound we hear through our stethoscopes. This hands-on lab experience is one students always remember. The foundation paid for a quantity of sheep hearts for use in the classroom.
Grant Year: 2016-2017
Grant Recipients: Joanne Mossman
Receiving Schools: Overlook Middle School