It’s an old silly song, look it up if you are not familiar with it. I couldn’t help but run that ditty through my head as the class learned all about the 206 bones in the human body. Although they were plastic copies, the realization that you are holding a part of what makes you, you is quite fascinating. It is easy to hold some of the bones up to the corresponding part of yourself, seeing how closely it matches. And there is something enthralling about holding a human skull in your hand, peering deep inside where the brain goes, the eyes, how the jaw meshes, where the nose and ears would be, you may feel like doing Hamlet while holding it, lamenting about poor Yorick, and how you knew him well.
The physiology of structure and the amazing symmetry of the assembly and how it ties everything together is one of the wonders of our creation, handiwork of a greater power and a symbol of our connection with our God. If one bone does not work right, all else performs poorly, not up to maximum efficiency. Think of the three bones in the ear; if one is faulty you cannot hear correctly. If a bone in the foot, say a phalanges is improperly formed, you will have problems walking and standing. We cannot be squished like a bug, but we can be broken in to little pieces.
The beauty of the form of bones is that they define who we are. Yes, apes and other mammals, including fish have an endoskeleton but none is designed like ours. Simians are close, but the way they walk and use there arms and hands is so different than us that we are not interchangeable. You can call someone a knuckle-dragger, but that only insults the great apes.
Bones are but a part of the whole, but without those hard and strong supports, we would never have learned to stand on our own two feet.
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Love your article. Was looking for information about this very topic. Thankyou
I too am working on the skeletal system and just checked out my plastic skull from the SRC. Your explanations and narrations are great!
I loved this post because we start our section on the bones and skeletal system next week and will be checking out our bone kits. I especially love the part about the human skull because that’s the first item I get to check out and take home for a week.
As you work on curate, narrate, share, consider how the judicious addition of images would make this text dense narration more appealing to readers.
Another online rule is to link, link, link! It is not enough to instruct readers to “look up” the song; you should provide the link, preferably to a You Tube presentation, and then reproduce some of the lyrics yourself.
Images of bones, a cartoon of a knuckle-dragging ape–all these would enliven your visual presentation.