App of the Week: Dr. Guts

What’s It Like? Dr. Guts is a game where middle and high school kids learn about the digestive, cardiovascular, excretory, and respiratory systems through online experimentation. Students act as a research assistant to Dr. Guts and look for ways to help patients with various health conditions. Students pick the patient they want to work on (with names like Diana Rhea and Will Gasserman) and then learn about different organ systems by dragging and dropping them into a body and linking them together. Then they test the systems by seeing how they handle food and liquids fed from a tube.

Price: $2.99; available online and via Amplify tablets

Grades: 5-12

Pros: Play lets kids experiment, encouraging student inquiry.

Cons: Initially the touch interface can be frustrating, but kids will figure it out.

Bottom line: A stellar tool that lets kids figure out how body systems work together to keep us alive.