Primary 6 · Science · Systems: Digestive
Systems: Digestive questions for Primary 6 Science
9 questions to work through online, 2 of them written out the way the paper asks. Answer and you get the working straight away, then a score at the end. No sign-up, and you can retake it as often as you like.
- Reasoning about a lettered diagram
- Where digestion ends
- Connecting two systems
- Reasoning about an experiment
- Why chewing matters
- What each part contributes
- Naming the process
- Naming a part
- Applying the ideas
Same picture as the question above.
| Tube | Food | Juice | Temperature (°C) | Food broken down |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | ✓ | ✓ | 37 | ✓ |
| B | ✓ | ✗ | 37 | ✗ |
| C | ✓ | ✓ | 5 | very little |
| D | ✗ | ✓ | 37 | nothing to break down |
Answers and explanations for all 9 questions
Every answer with the reasoning behind it. Worth reading after you have tried the set — or on its own, if you are a parent marking it.
Which statements about the diagram above are correct?
Answer: A, B and C only
Food at the gullet has hardly been digested and is far further along by Y, the job is finished in the small intestine, and water is taken out in the large intestine. Digestion begins in the mouth, not the gullet.
At which labelled part in the diagram above is digestion completed?
Answer: Y
Digestion is completed in the small intestine, Y, which is also where the digested food is absorbed.
How does digested food from a meal reach a muscle in the leg?
Answer: It passes into the blood at the small intestine and is pumped there by the heart.
The two systems meet at the small intestine: food crosses into the blood there, and the circulatory system delivers it wherever it is needed.
Based on the table above, which tube shows that the juice does not simply break itself down?
Answer: D
D has juice but no food. Nothing is broken down, which rules out the juice producing the same result on its own — each tube removes one alternative explanation.
Why does a person who swallows food in large lumps digest it more slowly?
Answer: Large lumps have less surface for the digestive juices to act on.
Digestive juices work on the surface of the food. Chewing multiplies that surface, so unchewed lumps take much longer to break down.
Which two of these describe what happens in the small intestine?
Answer: A and B only
The small intestine both finishes digestion and absorbs the results, which is why its enormous folded surface matters so much.
Digested food passes through the wall of the small intestine and into the blood. What is this process called?
Answer: absorption
Digested food passing into the blood is absorption.
Look at the part labelled Z in the diagram above, where water is taken out of what is left. What is the name of this part?
Answer: large intestine
Z is the large intestine, where water is absorbed from what remains.
Why does a stomach upset that hurries food through the intestines leave a person weak and thirsty?
Answer: Less food is absorbed in the small intestine and less water in the large intestine.
Both absorbing steps take time. Rushed through, the small intestine takes up less food and the large intestine less water — which is exactly weakness and thirst.