Dazzling Digestion

With the launch of the Eatwell Guide, we are exploring Health and Lifestyle.  

We began by reviewing our knowledge and understanding of the digestive system by following the course of a chocolate cake through the body.

First, we chewed a piece of bread for a minute to observe how the taste changes as saliva acts on the starch. Then we modelled the incisors acting on the cake in the mouth, added saliva and then ground the cake with the molars.  We used a tennis ball in a pair of tights to show how food passed down the oesophagus.

once the food was in the stomach we added coke to show how the enzymes act on food to break it down before it passes through into the small intestine where bile produced in the liver neutralises the acids and the nutrients from the food pass through to the bloodstream.   In the large intestine fluid is re absorbed into the body before the waste is finally excreted.