Sustran’s weekly challenge

Active School Travel
30 minutes
Raise your heart rate
Timer, pen, worksheet
SOLO ACTIVITY
Raise Your Heart Rate
The aim of this activity is to discover what activities you can do at home to raise your heart rate and help keep your heart healthy while you are off school.
One thing that you can do to keep your heart healthy is to make it beat faster for around 60 minutes each day.
Your heart is about the size of a pear and it sits in the middle of your chest just to the left.
The walls of your heart are made of very strong muscles that pump blood all around your body.
Your blood carries all of your oxygen, food, vitamins and minerals that your body needs to move, think, grow and repair itself.
At the same time your blood also takes the waste from your body to your lungs, kidneys and liver.
To find out how fast your heart is beating you need to take your pulse and there are two simple ways to do this.
How To Take Your Pulse
1. Take two fingers of your left hand and gently push them against the side of your Adam’s Apple (lump on the front of your neck under your mouth).
2. Turn your hand side wards with the thumb at the top. Place two fingers below the thumb onto your wrist.
Use a timer to count how many beats you feel in 30 seconds and then multiply X2 to get 1 minute.
This is your pulse.
If you can not find your pulse after a few tries, ask an adult to help you.
The Active School Travel Programme is an exciting initiative for schools who wish to see more of their pupils choosing an active and healthy journey to school. The programme provides schools with the skills and knowledge to get more children walking, cycling and scooting as their main mode of transport to school.
Find out more at www.sustrans.org.uk/NIschools

Active School Travel
Raise your heart rate
Raise Your Heart Rate
Raise Your Heart Rate Activities
Do each of the activities in the table below one at a time for 1 minute. When you complete each activity take your pulse and record it in the table. Take a 1 minute break between each activity to let your heart rest.
There are some blank spaces for you to come up with your own activity. Compare the results.
ACTIVITY
PULSE
STAND ON ONE LEG FOR 1 MINUTE
SITTING STILL FOR 1 MINUTE
DOING STAR JUMPS FOR 1 MINUTE
SITTING PLAYING A GAME FOR 1 MINUTE
RUN ON THE SPOT FOR 1 MINUTE
LIE DOWN FOR 1 MINUTE
DO PRESS UPS FOR 1 MINUTE
STAND STILL FOR 1 MINUTE
HOP ON THE SPOT FOR 1 MINUTE
DO FORWARD ROLLS FOR 1 MINUTE
The Active School Travel Programme is an exciting initiative for schools who wish to see more of their pupils choosing an active and healthy journey to school. The programme provides schools with the skills and knowledge to get more children walking, cycling and scooting as their main mode of transport to school.
Find out more at www.sustrans.org.uk/NIschools

Active School Travel
Raise your heart rate
Raise Your Heart Rate
Here are some things you could do with your results.
 Make a poster showing your results
 Produce a graph showing your results
 Each day that you are at home, do the five activities that raise your heart rate the most
 Do a research project to find out more about how the heart works
To share photos or videos of you raising your heart rate, ask your Mum or Dad or the adult that you live with to tag @SustransNI on social media and use the hashtag #stayhomestayactive
I’m looking forward to seeing how you are getting on!
The Active School Travel Programme is an exciting initiative for schools who wish to see more of their pupils choosing an active and healthy journey to school. The programme provides schools with the skills and knowledge to get more children walking, cycling and scooting as their main mode of transport to school.
Find out more at www.sustrans.org.uk/NIschools