Five tables are the organs of one teenager's body. Each table senses only its own numbers, so the Brain must tell the Skin to sweat and the class must talk to keep the body green.
One teenager's body on an ordinary school day: late for the bus, lunch and then gym, and practice in the heat. The class is the body's organs, at five tables, around a school athletic trainer's room.
Five tables run one teenager's body through Late for the bus, Lunch then gym, and Practice in the heat. Each table sees only what its own organs sense, so the class must talk, send hormones, share the blood and split the water cups to keep the numbers green.
Homeostasis lands in a high school Biology or Anatomy and Physiology unit on body systems and feedback, after students have met cells and organs and before or alongside a unit on hormones. Students need to know that organs work together and that blood carries things around the body. They do not need any chemistry, any numbers past reading a gauge, or any prior idea of insulin or ADH: the game introduces each signal when a table first sends it. Underneath the scenes, the game teaches negative feedback as a chain a student can trace: a sensor notices, a signal goes, an effector answers, and the number comes back. It also teaches that a body plans, which is why a class that talks can beat a body running on reflexes alone. It serves Biology 9-10, Anatomy and Physiology, and Health Science, and it gives students evidence from their own body's graphs for HS-LS1-3.
What Students Will Learn
Trace a negative feedback loop from the body's own graph: the sensor that noticed, the signal that went, the effector that answered, and whether (and how fast) the number came back.
Explain why a hormone sent before a change (insulin before lunch lands) keeps a number greener than one sent after it.
Predict at which beat a line leaves the green when one loop is cut, and whether the body stops, then test the prediction against a replay.
Describe how organ systems share a limited supply (blood, water) and what the body gives up when muscles and skin both need blood in the heat.
Cases Included
NGSS HS-LS1-3 (in part) - students gather evidence from their own body's graphs that feedback mechanisms maintain homeostasis, and in Break a loop predict and test what one cut loop does; they do not plan the investigation
NGSS HS-LS1-2 (in part) - students use a model of interacting organ systems (blood, hormones and nerves linking the tables, each running part of the body); the hierarchy from cells to systems is not modelled, and the optional extension asks what the model leaves out
Social & Emotional Learning (CASEL)
Aligned to the CASEL framework's core competencies. These are the SEL skills students actively practice while playing.
Relationship SkillsNo table can keep its numbers green alone: Callers walk to the tables they need every beat, Hosts answer them, and each table agrees before its Dialer sets a dial.
Responsible Decision-MakingHeart & Lungs decides who gets the limited blood, and Skin and Water Control split the cups at a water stop, weighing what each choice costs the rest of the body.
Flexible Class Sizes
15-35 kids: 5 tables
Five tables of 3 to 7. At 31-35 kids, give each table a second Caller and Heart & Lungs a second Host.
12-14 kids: 4 tables
Four tables of 3 or 4. Skin's dials join Heart & Lungs (Heart, Lungs & Skin). The body scores out of 24 a scene.
How the Game Plays Out
Roles Your Students Will Play
Click any role to see their background and what they are trying to accomplish.
Sugar Control
You run the Pancreas and the Liver. The Pancreas senses blood sugar and sends insulin or glucagon. The Liver stores sugar in packs and can make new sugar.
Goals
Keep blood sugar in the green (70-140 mg/dL) and keep the liver's sugar store at 2 packs or more.
Ask Water Control what is coming: a hormone you send arrives one beat later, so plan for food and for a run before it happens.
Muscles
You are the body's muscles. You move the body at the pace the coach asks, burn sugar from your own store and from the blood, and need blood for oxygen.
Goals
Keep the coach's pace unless your table agrees to ease: every beat you keep the pace the coach asks scores a point.
Ask Heart & Lungs for blood, and ask Water Control if the body is too hot or too dry to keep going.
Heart & Lungs
You are the Heart and the Lungs. You pump the body's blood and decide how much the skin may take and how much goes to the kidneys. The muscles get the rest.
Goals
Keep legs burning at no: muscles need blood for oxygen.
Listen to every table that comes to you, then split the blood: the skin needs it to cool, the kidneys to clean waste, the muscles to move.
Skin
You are the Skin. You feel your own surface; you cannot sense the CORE temperature. You open your blood vessels and sweat to let heat out, and you can pour water over the head at a water stop.
Goals
Help keep the core temperature green: ask Water Control for it every beat, because only the Brain senses the core.
Ask Heart & Lungs for the blood you need to cool, and agree with Water Control how to split the cups at a water stop.
Water Control
You run the Brain and the Kidneys. The Brain senses core temperature and body water and holds the plan: what is coming in the next beats. The Kidneys clean waste with the blood Heart & Lungs gives them.
Goals
Keep body water green and keep waste at 4 or less.
Tell every table what is coming, and tell Skin the core temperature every beat: only the Brain senses it.
Hand Each Student Their Own Sheet
One click on the teacher dashboard prints a dossier for every role - background, goals, key facts, and their confidential briefing - plus the primary-source packet and a vocabulary sheet. Print them, or save as PDF, so each student reads their role on paper instead of huddling around one screen. The app still runs the votes and the action; the paper just carries the reading.
Primary Sources
Every role includes real historical documents. Students read them because they need the information to make their case.
If a line on the graph left the green, ours or the reflex body's, point at it. Which organ sensed it, what signal went, and which organ answered? Did it come back, and after how many beats? If not, what was missing?
The reflex body had every loop but no plan. Where did knowing what was coming help our body, or where could it have helped?
In the heat, Muscles and Skin both needed blood. Who got it, and what did the body give up?
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