With the COVID-19 virus being officially announced by the World Health Organisation as a global pandemic this week, the most important thing we can do to stop it’s spread is ensuring we’re washing our hands properly and often.
Kids aren’t usually the best at practising good hygiene, because well, they’re kids - so parents and teachers are using some creative techniques to help them understand the importance of washing their hands.
One clever method parents are using is the pepper method, by filling a bowl of water, coating it with sprinkles of pepper, then asking their kids to dip their fingers in.
In this trick, the pepper represents germs, and when the kids stick their hands in, the ‘germs’ will stick, demonstrating how just rinsing with water won’t wash the germs away.
Parents then get their child to dip their finger in soap first, before putting it in the water again - and magically the pepper is repelled, showing kids the importance of using soap.
You can check out the method in the vid below...
The second method parents and teachers are using to demonstrate how quickly germs spread is by using glitter.
The adults are getting kids to cover their hands in different colours of glitter, then getting them to touch different objects and each other. This is to show how easily germs can spread from one person to everything they touch.
Get involved and teach your kids the importance of hand hygiene using these simple but effective tricks - the best way to learn is by having fun!
