In our house, we talk science a lot. Why? I love science. Our kids are tiny, so I have to explain things on their level and I thought some other littles might enjoy it, too.
Disclaimer: this is very basic and it won’t get your high school child a pass grade in Biology or Natural Sciences
Storm always has scrapes and bruises and always wants to know why her owies look like that, so here goes.
Your blood is made up of 4 parts. The plasma, which is sort of like water in a river and helps to transport everything. The platelets, they’re a bit like sticks and branches floating in the river. Red blood cells, those are like boats, they carry oxygen to your cells and carbon dioxide away. White blood cells, they’re like friendly monsters that eat all the bad things that try to get into your body.
Now, when we fall and break our skin, which protects our insides, blood comes out. At first, this is for the “river” to wash out any dirt. Then the platelets or sticks start getting stuck in the hole and slowly start building up a sort of wall. We call this coagulation. Behind our wall of sticks, the red and white blood cells get stuck and can do their jobs. The white blood cells, or monsters, eat any germs that might have gotten in, so they help keep us healthy. The boats carry oxygen to the cells that are busy growing behind the temporary scab wall to close up the hole.
As the hole is closed behind the wall, the wall starts falling away, because it is not needed any more. This can be quite itchy, because it also pulls at the part where there is still a hole. We should let scabs fall off by themselves, so that our bodies have enough time to build up behind them.