Lesson Plans, Whiteboard Activities and Take-Home Activities
Here you’ll find in-depth and fun lesson plans, whiteboard activities and take-home activities that meet educational standards to help you teach your students about stopping the spread of germs, good hygiene and the importance of keeping classrooms clean. Search by grade or lesson type below. Also access additional resources for promoting a healthy classroom, tips from other teachers, and more.
That’s why we’ve teamed up with teachers just like you to develop this site’s rich content. We hope it gives you the resources to teach students about healthy hygiene in a fun and engaging way. Our Faculty Panel members will also be sharing their own experiences, tips and advice for the classroom. You can learn more about our Panel members below and learn some of their tried and true tips for all types of positive classroom experiences.
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Michael Geisen
2008 National Teacher of the Year
Michael Geisen has been helping students experience science at Crook County Middle School in Prineville, Oregon, for the past nine years. Formerly a professional forester, the 2008 National Teacher of the Year’s creative and humorous approach to teaching is widely acclaimed for helping people of all ages understand and apply big concepts in education and science.
After a year as a full-time spokesperson for education, he still teaches adolescents in rural Oregon. He also teaches educators, policy-makers, and businesspeople around the world about high-quality teaching and learning.
Here are Some Classroom Tips from Michael
- We owe it to our kids to take risks, honor their curiosity, and get a bit messy!
- While teaching science, don’t rule out story time, whiteboard activities, music, kinesthetic modeling, theater, short field trips, and similar teaching techniques. The kids might think you’re a bit weird at first, but they’ll love you for it!
- Find a teacher of a different grade level in your district that you can share ideas with, or even start to develop a partnership between your students and theirs! Multi-age learning works both ways.
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Bonnie Embry
District Director for the National Science Teachers Association
Bonnie Embry has 25 years of experience sharing her love of science with children in classrooms and hands-on science labs. She also applies this passion to science curriculum and assessment development projects at the local, state, and national levels. In 1997, Embry was named Kentucky’s Elementary Science Teacher of the Year. She is a former president of the Kentucky Science Teachers Association and currently serves as the District VIII Director for the National Science Teachers Association.
Embry teaches in a K-5 science lab in Lexington, Kentucky. Given the hands-on nature of science labs, she encourages each and every one her 775 students to wash their hands before and after class and to wipe down desks and materials after use.
Here are Some Classroom Tips from Bonnie
- Students actively engaged in learning will be excited and can be noisy. Helping students learn the difference between good and bad noise is a great classroom management tool.
- Children love to solve mysteries so I use mystery bags in my science class to encourage students to develop better questioning strategies. I place something inside a brown paper bag and paper clip the top closed. Students must ask four questions (you can determine a different number) before anyone in the room can guess what is in the bag. If the first guess is wrong, students must ask another four questions before guessing again. Students very quickly determine the types of questions that give them the best information to guess correctly and it helps them develop skills to generate better questions for scientific investigations.
- Science classes use lots of hands-on materials. To reduce the spread of germs, I encourage students to wash their hands before class and I use disinfecting wipes to wipe off materials and clean tables.
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Chad Vincent
Physical Education Teacher | Athletic Director
Seven-year teaching veteran Chad Vincent is the physical education teacher and athletic director for grades 1-8 at Bannockburn School in Bannockburn, Illinois. Vincent aims to make his classes fresh and exciting by putting new twists on sports and games.
Proud of his school’s award-winning status in the 2010 Clorox I Don’t Want to Miss... contest, he stresses to students the importance of exercising, eating healthy, practicing hand washing and disinfecting surfaces to encourage a healthy lifestyle.
Here are Some Classroom Tips from Chad
- Every day, I ask students how they are going to get their 60 minutes of exercise. We should never underestimate the importance of daily exercise to the healthy growth and development of our students. Plus, exercise helps prevent illness – and it’s fun!
- Not only encourage your students in the classroom, incorporate fun ways for the students to encourage each other. It used to be common to give high fives during class, but we do the "fist bump," it really helps build a club or team atmosphere – and also helps prevent the spread of germs!
- I make an effort to reinforce with my students the healthy habits their parents are teaching kids at home. To make this fun for the students, I use the word "magic" to help describe something, which sparks the interest of the students. For example, before and after class we remind kids to use "magic soap," and sure enough – they remember to wash their hands!
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Michelle Anthony
Ph.D., a former teacher, development expert and author
Dr. Michelle Anthony works hands-on with educators, children and families in and out of the classroom. A former teacher, Dr. Anthony is also a child development expert, author of several children’s and parenting books, and feature writer for Scholastic’s Parent and Child Magazine. She is the founder of Wide-Eyed Learning, a company devoted to facilitating communication and learning between parents, educators, and children.
Dr. Anthony serves as a developmental expert in many venues, including for Scholastic Inc., at national educational conferences, and on the Rachael Ray show. Her most recent book, Little Girls Can Be Mean: Fours Steps to Bully-proof Girls in the Early Grades, is a parent and educator’s go-to guide for dealing with the growing issue of girl meanness in elementary school. She is mother to three children, two girls and a boy, all under the age of 11.
Here are Some Classroom Tips from Michelle
- Encourage your students to ask questions—and lots of them! Have each student create an “I Wonder... Notebook,” where they jot down questions they think up across the day or week. Remind them that wondering and asking questions are how scientific discoveries are made! Begin your science class by inviting a handful of students to share their questions. See if you can build off any of them for your next science experiment!
- Science is about discovering and uncovering the unknown, and there are lots of simple ways to make the process fun and the learning stick! Set the scene visually and generate excitement for science activities by making science smocks with your students. You can do a class tie-dye or decorate shirts with Sharpie markers.
- To take this to the next level, create a special science smock for you to wear using a process that will captivate the entire classroom. Read your class the book Robert Munsch’s Purple, Green, and Yellow and tell your students you have discovered a way to remove “super-indelible-never-comes-off-till-you’re-dead markers!” Then, after drawing a design with Sharpie markers, spray your shirt with rubbing alcohol (or dribble a few drops on) and watch rainbows appear.* Suddenly, much to your enraptured students’ surprise, you’re in the midst of a lesson about color mixing, solubility, and molecule movement!
*Be sure to do this in a well ventilated area and to wash your shirt before your next wear, as rubbing alcohol is flammable.
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