Maya’s Mysteries: Every Breath You Take

“Do you realize how much you should thank God for His blessings? If you should thank Him a thousand times with each breath, it would not be sufficient ...”
—‘Abdu’l-Bahá

 

Take a deep breath. Do you know what amazing things are happening in your lungs? It’s incredible! When you breathe in, air comes through your trachea, or windpipe, and fills each lung. Then the air goes into thousands of little tubes called bronchioles. Each is about the thickness of a single hair! From there, air flows into tiny air sacs called alveoli—there are about 480 million of them! The alveoli let oxygen pass into your blood. Then it goes to your heart and the other muscles in your body. And that’s just one breath—kids take over 34,000 breaths a day!

I’m thankful for all the work our lungs and heart do to keep us healthy. If you want to learn more about how yours work, try this cool activity. Then you can relax and take a breather!

 

Try this activity on your own or with family and friends to explore how your breath powers your body.

1. Sitting calmly, find your pulse by placing two fingers on the inside of your wrist. Count the beats for 15 seconds. Multiply to get your heart rate per minute. 

         beats x 4 =

         beats per minute

 

2. Still sitting, count how many breaths you take in 15 seconds. Multiply for your breaths per minute. 

         breaths x 4 =

         breaths per minute

 

3. What do you think your heart and breathing rates will be after exercise?

                                                                                                                  

                                                                                                                  

 

4. Spend four minutes exercising. Run around, dance, do jumping jacks—anything that gets you moving quickly. 

 

5. After four minutes, record heart rate and breathing rates again. 

         beats x 4 =

         beats per minute

         breaths x 4 =

         breaths per minute

 

6. Rest for two minutes, then check your heart and breathing rates again.

         beats x 4 =

         beats per minute

         breaths x 4 =

         breaths per minute

 

How It Works

When we exercise, our breathing and heart rates speed up. This brings more oxygen through our lungs, into our blood, across a vast network of blood vessels, and into our busy muscles to keep them moving. What a cool, efficient system, huh? Did you know that car engines take in oxygen to produce energy, too?

 

For a printable version, download a PDF of this activity.

Updated 11/09/2020 Maya’s Mysteries94 Maya118 Science and Health51 STEM261 STEM Station30 Experiments14 Air4 Hearts15 Oxygen5 Characters466 STEAM43 STEAMS69