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The Lub-Dub Club
A 3D tour of the heart that follows one little blood cell round the body, for children about five to eight. Free, with no ads and no sign-ups.
What your child will learn
- Your heart is a pump about the size of your fist, with two sides and four rooms: two atria on top and two ventricles underneath, with the septum between the sides.
- The right side (blue in the tour) sends blood to the lungs; the left side (red) sends it round the body.
- Arteries carry blood away from the heart, and veins bring it back. The aorta is the biggest artery.
- Blood picks up oxygen in the lungs and drops it off in tiny vessels called capillaries.
- Valves are one-way doors, and the lub-dub of a heartbeat is them snapping shut.
- You can feel your heart working: your pulse, on your wrist.
How it works
Story. A wombat tells it in nine short chapters, and the camera follows one blood cell (it wears an orange ring) from a vein, through the heart, to the lungs, back through the heart, out to the legs and home. Every word is spoken and shown.
Explore. Turn the heart, open it like a book, pick a heart speed (a sleepy koala, a walking wombat or a running emu), follow a blood cell, or tap any part to hear what it does. What's this? shows the parts one at a time.
Quiz. Six picture questions, read aloud, so it works before your child can read. A wrong answer greys out and they have another go; nothing is ever lost. Finishing brings a new animal for their My animal friends book, and a card of the words they now know.
The real words it teaches
The tour uses the real names for the parts of the heart, and says what each one means the first time. Children love owning a big word. These are on the card at the end, and a tap on each says what it means.
- Atria: the heart's two top rooms.
- Ventricles: the heart's two bottom rooms. They do the big squeezes.
- Septum: the wall down the middle of your heart.
- Valve: a one-way door, so blood only goes forward.
- Artery: a tube that carries blood away from your heart.
- Aorta: your biggest artery.
- Vein: a tube that brings blood back to your heart.
- Capillaries: tiny tubes where blood drops off its oxygen.
What it practises
- My body. Naming the parts of the body, and how they work: from knees and elbows (Head to Toe) to the heart's atria and ventricles (the What Makes Me tours).
AC9S1U01 (Science, Year 1); AC9HPFM03 (Health and Physical Education, Foundation)
The codes are from the Australian Curriculum v9 (Foundation to Year 1). Each links to the official wording. The heart itself isn't in the curriculum until much later; the tour gives young children the words and the picture early.
Things to try together
- Find your pulse: palm up, two fingers on the wrist just below the thumb. Count the bumps.
- Do twenty star jumps and find it again. Faster? That's the running emu.
- Put an ear to each other's chest and listen for the lub-dub.
- Make a fist. That's about how big your heart is.
What's simplified, and why
- Blood is drawn blue and red, the way picture books do; the tour says once, out loud, that real blood is always red.
- The heart is drawn bigger than life, and upright with its sides left and right, so a child can see inside it.
- The lungs are drawn above the heart, as in the picture book, rather than on either side of it.
- Two squeezes are shown for each beat (the atria, then the ventricles), both sides together.
- Arteries are called the tubes that carry blood away from the heart, and veins the ones that bring it back. The artery to the lungs carries blue (oxygen-poor) blood, which is why it's direction, not colour, that makes an artery.
- The four valves are all just "valves" in the tour. Their names (tricuspid, pulmonary, mitral and aortic) are left for later.
Where the facts come from
Every fact the tour states was checked against the page linked beside it.
- Your heart is a muscle about the size of your fist, in the middle of your chest.
In the tour: It's about as big as your fist.
British Heart Foundation — How your heart works - The heart has a left side and a right side, separated by a wall (the septum), each with a room at the top (atrium) and one at the bottom (ventricle).
In the tour: Your heart has two sides: the right side, which we colour blue, and the left side, which we colour red. Each side has a top room called an atrium, and a bottom room called a ventricle. A wall called the septum keeps the two sides apart.
British Heart Foundation — How your heart works - The right side pumps blood to the lungs; the left side pumps it to the whole body through the aorta, the largest artery.
In the tour: The right ventricle pushes us up an artery to your lungs… Out we shoot, into the aorta, your biggest artery.
Better Health Channel (Victorian Government) — Circulatory system - Valves keep blood flowing one way and stop it flowing backwards.
In the tour: That's a valve. It's a one-way door.
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute — How blood flows through the heart - Arteries take blood away from the heart and veins bring it back. The pulmonary artery is the one artery that carries oxygen-poor blood (to the lungs), and the pulmonary veins bring oxygen-rich blood back, which is why the rule is about direction, not colour.
In the tour: Arteries carry blood away from your heart, and veins bring it back.
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute — How blood flows through the heart ("Veins bring blood to your heart. Arteries take blood away from your heart.") - The 'lub-dub' of the heartbeat is the heart's valves closing.
In the tour: Lub-dub! That sound is your valves snapping shut.
Better Health Channel (Victorian Government) — Heart murmur - In the lungs, blood gives up carbon dioxide and picks up oxygen; in the capillaries, oxygen passes to the body's cells; veins bring blood back to the heart.
In the tour: Our cell grabs some oxygen… and it drops off carbon dioxide, a gas you breathe out… drops its oxygen off for your muscles… into a vein, and back to the heart.
Better Health Channel (Victorian Government) — Circulatory system ("taken by an artery to the lungs where the carbon dioxide is replaced with oxygen") - The left ventricle has the thickest, strongest wall, because it pumps blood at the highest pressure, all round the body.
In the tour: Into the left ventricle, the strongest room of all… The left ventricle has the thickest wall.
Ventricle (heart), Wikipedia, and NHLBI (the left ventricle generates the high pressure needed to pump blood to the whole body) - Blood is always red: bright red with oxygen, darker red without. It is never blue; veins only look blue through skin.
In the tour: We colour it blue, but real blood is always red. It's just darker when it needs oxygen.
Live Science — If blood is red, why do veins look bluish? - The heart beats around 100,000 times a day.
In the tour: Your heart beats about a hundred thousand times every day.
British Heart Foundation — How your heart works - At rest the heart pumps about the body's whole blood volume each minute, so blood goes round in about a minute.
In the tour: Your blood goes all the way round your body in about a minute.
The Naked Scientists — How quickly does a blood cell circulate? - You can feel your pulse on the thumb side of your wrist, palm up.
In the tour: Turn your hand palm up, and put two fingers on your wrist, just below your thumb.
healthdirect — Resting heart rate
Every word it says
The whole script, for reading along, or for a child who'd rather read than listen.
1. Meet your heart
- Hello! I'm Wombat. Let's see how your heart works!
- Right in the middle of your chest is your heart.
- It's about as big as your fist. Make a fist and have a look!
- Your heart is a pump. It squeezes blood all the way round your body, all day and all night.
2. Two sides, one beat
- Let's peek inside!
- Your heart has two sides: the right side, which we colour blue, and the left side, which we colour red.
- They're your right and your left, so when you look at them, they seem swapped round, like a friend's hands.
- Each side has a top room called an atrium, and a bottom room called a ventricle.
- That's two atria at the top, and two ventricles underneath.
- A wall called the septum keeps the two sides apart.
- Both sides squeeze at the same time. Lub-dub, lub-dub!
3. Back from the body
- See the blood cell with the orange ring? That's our friend. Let's follow it!
- It's coming back from your body in a big vein, and it has given away most of its oxygen.
- We colour it blue, but real blood is always red. It's just darker when it needs oxygen.
- In it goes, into the right atrium.
4. Through the one-way door
- See the white flaps? That's a valve. It's a one-way door.
- When the atrium squeezes, the valve swings open.
- Then snap! It shuts behind our cell, so blood can't go backwards.
5. Off to the lungs
- Squeeze! The right ventricle pushes our cell up an artery to your lungs.
- Every time you breathe in, your lungs fill with fresh air.
- Look, bubbles of oxygen! Our cell grabs some and turns bright red. Ta-da!
- And it drops off carbon dioxide, a gas you breathe out.
6. Back to the red side
- Full of oxygen, our cell zooms back to the heart along a vein.
- This time it goes in on the red side, into the left atrium.
- Through another valve, into the left ventricle, the strongest room of all.
7. The big push
- The left ventricle gives a mighty squeeze!
- Out it shoots, into the aorta, your biggest artery.
- Arteries carry blood away from your heart, and veins bring it back.
- Its walls stretch with every push. That's your pulse!
- Turn your hand palm up, and put two fingers on your wrist, just below your thumb. Can you feel it going bump, bump?
8. Tiny roads
- The arteries split into tiny little roads called capillaries.
- Here our cell drops its oxygen off for your muscles, so you can run and jump and climb.
- Now it's blue again. Into a vein, and back to the heart it goes, to do it all again!
9. Lub-dub!
- Listen. Lub-dub! That sound is your valves snapping shut.
- Your heart beats about a hundred thousand times every day.
- And your blood goes all the way round your body in about a minute.
- Thanks for watching with me. Welcome to the Lub-Dub Club!
The quiz
Quiz time! Let's see what you remember. The right answers are in bold.
- Which side of your heart sends blood to your lungs? (The right side, coloured blue / The left side, coloured red)
- Where does your blood pick up oxygen? (In your lungs / In your head / In your legs)
- What does a valve do? (It makes blood red / It's a one-way door / It breathes in air)
- Which room gives the strongest squeeze? (The left ventricle / The right atrium)
- Which tubes carry blood away from your heart? (Veins / Arteries)
- What makes the lub-dub sound? (Blood splashing / Your tummy rumbling / Valves snapping shut)
Big Steps: two harder questions
With Big Steps on, for seven- and eight-year-olds, two harder questions follow the six, each about a fact the tour states:
- Why does the left ventricle have the thickest, strongest wall? (It holds the most air / It pumps blood all the way round your body / It makes the lub-dub sound)
From: Ventricle (heart), Wikipedia, and NHLBI (the left ventricle generates the high pressure needed to pump blood to the whole body) - When you're resting, about how long does your blood take to go all the way round your body? (About a minute / About a day / About a year)
From: The Naked Scientists — How quickly does a blood cell circulate?
For every child
- Every word is spoken and written, so it works with the sound on or off.
- It works with a keyboard: the arrow keys turn the heart in Explore, and What's this? steps through the parts.
- If your device asks for less motion, the camera cuts instead of flying, the heart beats more calmly and the confetti stays still.
- On a slower phone or tablet it quietly draws fewer blood cells, so it stays smooth.
What it needs, and what we collect
A recent browser on a phone, tablet or computer. The first visit downloads about 5 MB, and after that it keeps working with no signal. Nothing about your child is collected: the My animal friends card and the sound setting are kept on your own device. The privacy page has the whole story.
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