Provide a metaview, lifting students into a wider view of the concept. Use another medium (not reading or writing) to connect students' personal knowing to the concept (i.e. visual arts, music, movement, metaphor, etc.) Involve learners in reflective production that blends the emotional and the cognitive.

Guided fantasy, film, and essay

Objective: To use guided fantasy to help students internalize the movement of the circulatory system.

Activity: The teacher will draw the shape of the bicuspid and the tricuspid valves on the board, seen in cross section. Then have the students close their eyes, breathe deeply several times and relax. Tell them they are going to experience a guided fantasy in which they will be blood cells, moving through a human body. The teacher then reads the following guided fantasy: "You are in a magic place. A friendly wizard is standing in front of you. She smiles and lifts her golden wand and suddenly you begin to shrink. You are not afraid. You know the wizard is going to allow you to have a great adventure. You are getting smaller and smaller. Suddenly you are the size of a single blood cell. You feel fine. You are lighter than air. You are buoyant and floating free. "You find yourself in a soft, blue tunnel. As you look in front of you, you notice that this tunnel is growing larger. You begin to hear a soft noise in the distance toward which you are traveling. You are moving along at a steady pace. "Lub dub, lub dub, lub dub." As you move further down the tunnel, it continues to grow larger, and the noise gets louder. "Lub dub, lub dub, lub dub." Suddenly you see a closed door in front of you. It is a double swinging door and it is opening away from you. You are carried through the door along with millions of others like you. The door closes softly behind you. You now notice that for every great sweep of motion forward, you slide back a little. The door prevents you from going backwards. There is only one way you can go, and that is forward. The door behind you is one of the valves in a vein, and you now become aware that you are inside a human body. "The noise is getting louder. "Lub dub, lub dub, lub dub." You are moving towards the noise. There is a large opening in front of you. You slide through the opening and you find yourself in a large chamber. Everything is still a soft blue around you. You notice how much bigger this space is. The walls are much thicker. They look stronger. They are slender strips intertwined. You notice there is another tunnel similar to the one you were in also leading into this chamber, but it is beneath you. You notice millions of others like you are also entering this chamber. "You suddenly become aware that you have traveled through the superior vena cava, and you are now in the right atrium of the heart. You now know that you have traveled from the head of the person whose body you are floating in. So now you know that the others like you arriving beneath where you are, are traveling through the inferior vena cava and were in the lower part of the body. "The noise is resonating through you. It is unbelievable loud. The "lub dub" is booming through your being. But it is not uncomfortable, it is exciting. You feel you are in the center of the universe. "Suddenly you feel the walls of the chamber contracting, you are being squeezed toward the only door leading out of the chamber. This door is different; you have never seen a door like this before. It has three leaves, and they all are opening away from you. When you get closer, you see three triangular parts...you smile as you think of how much it looks like the emblem on a Mercedes Benz! But you do not have time to dwell on that. Another companion floats nearby and shouts in passing, 'it's the tricuspid valve,' and adds with great excitement, 'there's not another one like it!' You are squeezed through this door and you find yourself in another chamber, even larger than the one you just left. It looks the same, but the walls appear to be stronger and thicker. It is still a wonderful blue all around you. The walls are blue, the atmosphere is blue, and you notice for the first time that your fellow travelers are also blue. You look at yourself, and discover that you are round, soft, and blue, too. This new chamber is the right ventricle of the heart of the person in whose body you are having this wonderful ride. "Before you have a chance to look around, you feel another squeeze coming. This one is much stronger and pushes you racing and rushing toward another double swinging door, which also swings outward away from you. This is the semilunar valve. As you rush toward this door, carried along, you hear a very loud noise behind you. "DUB!!!" It is the sound of the slamming tricuspid valve behind you. You are swept through this valve, and your companions are now all crowded together with you. No one is uncomfortable. It reminds you of those wonderful roller coaster rides when you were a child, the wind whipping your hair, and the great excitement. "You are now in a new tunnel, it is still light blue and it is beginning to narrow, to get smaller and smaller. You feel pressure and you have to move fast. Behind you, you hear the softer sound of the closing semilunar valve, "LUB!!!" As you are rushed along, you find yourself in the narrowest part of this new tunnel. You can hardly fit in by yourself, and you notice you and your companions are now in single file. You have moved from the pulmonary into a capillary. The walls are very thin (almost transparent) and the space is so narrow. As you continue on in single file, the tunnel curves and you are moving around a balloon-like chamber. You can see the walls of the chamber through the transparency of the tunnel. You see the balloon expanding and contracting, and if you listen carefully, you hear the sound of air moving in and out of the balloon, "Shush shush, shush shush." "The balloon chamber around which you are moving is one of the air sacs of the lung. You hear one of your companions whisper, "It's an alveolus." You see your companions in front of you are changing. You look again. They are slowly turning red. You are now moving right next to the transparent wall of the balloon-like chamber. You cannot be through it and you begin to see a substance separating from you. You realize you are changing color. The substance that made you blue moves through the wall into the air sacs. You are losing carbon dioxide. "You feel something strange is happening to you. You are gaining another substance and this substance is turning you red. You start to feel peppier, better somehow, more alive in a way you cannot describe. The new color suits you; you like it. You are becoming one with oxygen. "You do not have time to think; there is no stopping. You are still moving single file when you notice the tunnel is now getting larger. You do not feel so crowded. You start to hear the familiar "lub dub, lub dub" again. You see another opening, and you are carried into another chamber. It is very much like the first one you were in, but there is one wonderful difference. It is a beautiful deep red, like burgundy wine, like a wonderful deep red sun you saw reflecting in an ocean once. The noise is very loud. "Lub dub, lub dub, lub dub . . . " you feel fascinated and excited. You know you are safe here in the left atrium of the heart. You just moved into it from the pulmonary vein. You are right next to the chamber you were in first. You feel the walls squeezing you again. Squeezing you toward the only exit from this beautiful red chamber. "You continue on through this valve and find yourself in another chamber, the walls look very strong and thick and everything is tinted red, bright red. Before you know it, you feel the greatest squeeze yet . . . this is a BIG squeeze. You rush out through another swinging double door. You realize it is the semilunar valve, moving you from the left ventricle into the aorta, the largest tunnel so far. It is huge with branches leading out from it. And the noise, oh the noise! The loudest "DUB!" sound. It is the slamming of the bicuspid valve. "Some of your companions are separating from you, and behind you, you hear a softer "lub" sound which comes from the closing semilunar valve. You are taken into one of the branches going down, while others go through different branches. You smile at each other and say "See you around . . ." Somehow you know you will see each other again. You are being pushed towards something in a great rush. One of your companions shouts as you move downwards, "This guy must be jogging." The tunnel you are in is getting smaller and smaller and suddenly you find yourself in single file again. The tunnel is still red. As you move through this tiny tunnel with transparent walls, you see long slender columns lying next to each other on either side of this tunnel. These are the cells of the muscles. You now become aware that you have reached your destination. You feel the part of your substance, the beautiful red part, the oxygen is moving away from you through the transparent walls and into the muscle cells. And another substance is moving towards you, through the transparent wall, and when it joins you, you feel a familiar presence. You have given something away, and gotten something in return. As you look around, you notice your companions are changing in color again. They are turning blue. You look down at yourself and see that you are also blue again. "Suddenly you are pushed upwards, but you feel you are beginning to fade. The wizard's face grows more and more clear and you bid a fond "goodbye" to your companions as they return back upwards towards the heart to continue their journey forever." After the fantasy and a brief discussion, show a film on blood circulation. (There are many excellent films available.) Have the students write a short essay on the guided fantasy and the film. Encourage them to use metaphors to describe how the circulation of the blood works.

Assessment: Quality of the essays in terms of understanding the concept.