Inner-Outer Travel Guide (Fight⚔️💨Flight Edition)
This time we're visiting the largest natural habitat zoo in the US, TWO brain museums, and our nervous system.
Inner-Outer Guides pair travel around the mind & body with a road trip. Each "stop" offers concrete connections to abstract learning.
Welcome to your travel guide, with visits to the Brain, the North Carolina Zoo, and TWO Brain Museums. Let's get started!
If you have 2 minutes
The Fight-or-Flight Tour
Let's start out by exploring fight-or-flight, a stress response that kicks in when a problem or threat comes on our radar.
Technically, the full threat response is "fight, flight, or freeze." For simplicity's sake (I mean, we have 2 minutes), we're going with the shorter version.
First Stop: The North Carolina Zoo, Asheboro
The NC Zoo is the largest natural habitat zoo in the world, situated on 2,600 acres. Animals have room to roam and distance from zoo visitors. This can make all the difference to an animal feeling safe, the opposite state of fight-or-flight.
With a threat (or big problem), our bodies are designed to spring into action. Humans once lived side-by-side with animals like the saber-tooth tiger. Not exactly relaxing neighbors to have around...
When we go into fight-or-flight, our body is prepped to fight, run, or freeze. The fight-flight part of our nervous system takes over and does a bunch of stuff to help us take action, like sending oxygen to our heart so we can run fast, and dilating our eyes so we can see better - even when it's dark outside.
