Our Body and Health

Overview

"Our Body and Health" is a foundational topic in Environmental Studies for JKTET Paper I, targeting teachers who will work with children in Classes I–V. This topic connects the child's immediate experience—their own body—to broader concepts of health, hygiene and disease prevention. For the exam, you must know the basic body parts, the five sense organs and their functions, principles of personal and community hygiene, and common childhood diseases with their prevention measures.

This topic frequently appears in JKTET because it tests both content knowledge and the ability to make abstract biological concepts accessible to young learners. Questions often link body systems to daily habits (handwashing, balanced diet, clean water) and to the specific health challenges of J&K's climate and terrain. Expect 3–5 questions blending factual recall with pedagogical application.

Key Concepts

• **External body parts** include head, neck, trunk, limbs (arms and legs), hands, feet, fingers and toes. Children learn to identify, name and understand the function of each.

• **Internal organs** at the primary level focus on heart (pumps blood), lungs (breathing), stomach (digestion), brain (thinking and control) and kidneys (filter waste).

• **Sense organs** are five: eyes (sight), ears (hearing), nose (smell), tongue (taste) and skin (touch). Each organ has a receptor that sends signals to the brain.

• **Personal hygiene** covers daily habits—bathing, brushing teeth, washing hands before eating and after toilet use, trimming nails and wearing clean clothes.

• **Community hygiene** includes clean drinking water, proper sanitation, garbage disposal and avoiding open defecation—critical in rural J&K.

• **Balanced diet** means food from all groups: carbohydrates, proteins, fats, vitamins, minerals and water. Malnutrition and deficiency diseases result from imbalance.

• **Common diseases** at primary level include cold, cough, diarrhoea, typhoid, malaria, dengue, jaundice and worm infections. Children learn causes, symptoms and prevention.

• **First aid basics** involve simple responses to cuts, burns, insect bites and nosebleeds—important in remote mountain schools of J&K.

Key Facts

| Category | Must-Remember Points | |----------|---------------------| | Sense organs | Eyes → sight; Ears → hearing; Nose → smell; Tongue → taste (sweet, salty, sour, bitter); Skin → touch, temperature, pain | | Heart | Pumps blood; located slightly left of centre in chest; beats about 72 times per minute in adults | | Lungs | Two spongy organs; take in oxygen, release carbon dioxide; protected by ribcage | | Stomach | Digests food using acids and enzymes; located in upper abdomen | | Brain | Control centre; protected by skull; coordinates all body functions | | Teeth types | Incisors (cutting), canines (tearing), molars (grinding); children have 20 milk teeth, adults have 32 permanent teeth | | Waterborne diseases | Diarrhoea, cholera, typhoid, jaundice — spread through contaminated water | | Airborne diseases | Cold, cough, tuberculosis, measles — spread through droplets in air | | Vector-borne diseases | Malaria (mosquito), dengue (Aedes mosquito) — common in Jammu plains during monsoon | | Deficiency diseases | Night blindness (Vitamin A), scurvy (Vitamin C), rickets (Vitamin D), anaemia (iron) |