Sense of Touch

Sense of Touch

Sense of Touch
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 6 to 7
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	5.91

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		epidermis, detection, paperclip, sandpaper, hearing, reading, fairly, sensitivity, dermis, environment, various, organ, assortment, layer, ability, interesting
	content words:		Sensitivity Test, Two-Point Discrimination Test, Detection Threshold, Reduced Tactile Information

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Sense of Touch
By Sharon Fabian

¹     The largest organ in your body is your skin. It weighs from six to ten pounds. It is made of two layers, the epidermis or the top layer, and the dermis or the bottom layer. The top part of the epidermis is a layer of dead skin cells. These flake off and are replaced all the time. The skin contains hair follicles, nerve endings, sweat glands, and blood vessels. The skin is the main organ of the sense of touch.

²     The nerve endings in the skin can detect pressure, pain, and temperature. If you put your hand in a box to search around for something, you can tell when you've found it by feeling the pressure of the object. The ability to sense pain is a warning device. It warns us to quickly pull our hand away from a hot stove, or not to grab hold of the wrong end of a pair of scissors. The ability to sense temperature is a safety feature too. It reminds us to bundle up when we go out in winter weather, and to stop and cool off after exercising.

³     Your sense of touch allows you to tell the difference between rough and smooth, soft and hard, and wet and dry. Some parts of your skin have more nerve endings that other parts, so some parts are more sensitive to touch than others are. Your fingertips, tongue, and lips have the most nerve endings. It is interesting to see just how well your sense of touch works. Maybe you would like to try some of these tests to find out.

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