After talking about the importance of hand washing, take your students to a sink to let them practice proper techniques. Show students how to run their hands under warm water and then fill one of their palms with soap. Instruct them to rub their hands together, creating a lather. Once they have a lather, tell them to spread the soap all over their hands and fingers, singing the alphabet song as they do so. After singing the song, show them how to run their hands under warm water to rinse off the soap and germs and then thoroughly dry their hands. Allow all of your students to practice washing their hands.
Instead of simply talking to your students about how washing their hands kills germs, show them. Cover your hands with glitter and shake the hands of one of your students, spreading the glitter to her hands. Instruct the student you shook hands with to shake the hands of someone else and so on until all classmates have shaken hands. With each handshake, glitter will spread. Instruct students to look at their hands and discuss how the glitter represents how germs are spread. Take your students to the sink to wash their hands and have them look at their hands to see how the glitter, or germs, have been washed away.
Play a game with students that reinforces the times when it's important to wash their hands. Set out a clean wastepaper basket and provide children with small balls. Ask them to take turns naming a time when it is important to wash their hands, such as after using the bathroom, after playing outside or before eating. If a student correctly names a time to wash his hands, he may try to shoot a ball into the basket; if the ball lands in the basket, he earns a point. The child who earns the most points wins the game.
Have your students create hand-washing books. Provide children with paper and crayons and instruct them to draw pictures that illustrate times when it is important to wash their hands, such as after playing with animals, after blowing their noses or sneezes or before playing with babies. After they have created their pictures, stack them together and bind them with staples to create a book.