Stop the Germs: Choose the Healthy Way

Every row on this 1st grade page is a small choice between two ways of doing the same thing. There are four rows of two pictures, and the child circles the picture that stops germs from spreading. On the sheet shown a child coughs into an elbow beside a child coughing into the air; hands are scrubbed with soap under a running tap beside the same hands at the sink with the tap off and germs drawn on the palms; two children drink from one shared cup beside two children each with a cup of their own; and a used tissue lies on the floor by a bin beside a tissue dropped into the bin.

Germs are invisible, so children learn about them through actions they can see, and each row pairs a habit with its careless twin. The difference is often small, a raised arm or a cup of your own, and that is what makes children look. In the soap row the germs are drawn as small spiky dots on the hands that were not washed, which gives children a way to talk about what soap and water take away. The healthy picture sits on the left in two rows and on the right in the other two.

One sheet, four circles. Use it at the start of the cold season, or after a lesson on coughing and sneezing. Each row can become a quick act-it-out in front of the class. The next face asks why we do these habits at all, and the chart face lets children track the healthy ones at home for a week.