Germy Wormy started out as a character drawn onto a chopped off top of a sock that I put on my daughter’s elbow over her sleeve. She loves feeding Germy Wormy all her germs. Mission accomplished! She wasn’t giving her germs everywhere! I got sick less often.
She was still getting sick though. Why? She was still touching everything and getting every germ on the planet. Kids touch 300 surfaces in half an hour. Surfaces that are covered in germs 99 percent of the time.
Now, getting germs on hands won’t make kids sick. It is the next step where they then take those germy hands and fingers and proceed to place them in their mouth, nose, eyes, and ears, letting the germs in their bodies that make them sick. To totally reduce the spread of germs, you also have to teach how not to get germs in the first place.
More internet research boiled down to the Germ Stoppers 5—the top five things kids can do to keep from getting germs. I added an activity with glitter glue to show why they should do the five and to make those invisible germs visible. After, if she went to pick her nose, whined about washing her hands, all I had to say was Germ Stoppers 5. She would remember and stop.
She stopped getting sick as much, but her friends were still giving her germs. We had a Germy Wormy play date where I put on a puppet show and did the Germ Stoppers 5 activity. It was a hit. I took it to her pre-school and it was a hit again. They were amazed at how the kids took to it and “jumped on the bandwagon.” That year only one major illness spread around the school. The “one gets sick, the rest drop like flies” rule no longer applied.
Today, Germy Wormy is no longer the top of a sock but a commercially available disposable sleeve. The way I taught her and her friends is a complete program to make teaching your child about germs fun, fast, and easy—kids love it! The Germy Wormy Germ Awareness Program is now available online for you to enjoy the same success. If you make it fun, they will do it. If you make it visual and interactive, they will understand it. Get sick less often—get the Germy Wormy! Spread the word—not the germs.
