Summary

This unit laid the anatomical and physiological foundation for the rest of physical education. The key ideas, in the book's order, are these.

• Anatomy and physiology, and their importance. Anatomy (from the Greek for 'to cut apart') is the study of the structure of the body and the relationships between its parts; its broad categories are gross (macroscopic) and microscopic anatomy. Physiology is the study of the functions of the body and its responses to activity; its branches are human physiology and cellular & systemic physiology. The two are important for physical fitness, knowledge of body structure and organ function, the selection of games, protection from injuries, rehabilitation, maintaining a healthy body, and understanding the differences between male and female athletes.

• The skeletal system. The skeleton is the body's internal framework of bones, cartilages, joints and ligaments - about 300 bones at birth, 206 in an adult. Its parts are the axial and appendicular skeletons; its functions are shape and support, movement, protection, mineral storage and the production of blood cells (haemopoiesis). Bones are classified by tissue (compact, spongy) and by shape (long, short, flat, irregular, sesamoid). Joints are classified by function (synarthroses, amphiarthroses, diarthroses) and by structure (fibrous - with sutures, syndesmoses, gomphoses; cartilaginous; synovial). The six synovial joints are ball-and-socket, hinge, pivot, gliding, saddle and condyloid.

• Muscles. The three types are skeletal (voluntary, striated), smooth (involuntary, non-striated) and cardiac (involuntary, striated, heart only). Skeletal muscle's four properties are excitability, contractility, extensibility and elasticity. The functions of muscles are movement, maintenance of posture, heat generation, respiration, constriction of organs and vessels, and the pumping of blood.

• The circulatory system and heart. The system comprises the heart, the blood vessels (arteries, veins, capillaries) and the blood. The heart is a four-chambered muscular pump (two atria, two ventricles) divided by a septum, working in systole and diastole. Blood travels in three circuits - pulmonary, systemic and coronary; cardiac output = stroke volume x heart rate. …