An opportunity to learn about hygiene

With everything that is going on in the world, it’s easy to become worried and afraid of doing anything.  But it’s important that we don’t instil fear and inaction in our children, and instead help them to understand what we can do to proactively to stay healthy.

After all, viruses and bacteria have always been a part of our lives.  They are everywhere around us and we can’t escape them. Coronavirus is just one of many incarnations, just a particularly nasty variety.

So we thought, let’s use this as an opportunity to teach good habits around personal hygiene. And ensure our children stay active and positive.

For starters, we decided to have the children be actively engaged in washing their hands more than usual whilst at the service. We implemented the activity where everyone in the service should wash their hands every two hours. We do this at 8am, 10am, 12pm, 2pm, 4pm & 6pm, in addition to ensuring we have good discipline of hygiene in our every day activities. We make this a fun group activity and the children are enthusiastic in adopting this new practice.

Today the Orange room participated in a particularly fun experiment with water and pepper. We filled a bowl with water, and sprinkled some finely ground pepper over the top. The children then dipped their finger in some soap and placed it in the bowl. When they put their soapy finger in the peppery water, the pepper disperses just like germs do when we wash our hands correctly.

This proved to be a great visual demonstration that was both engaging, and an important lesson for life.  But importantly, the kids loved it!

Read more about Story House Early Learning Tarneit.