Did you ever notice that little kids can go for hours with snot hanging from their noses and not even notice it? They get so focused on activity they don’t even stop long enough to bend an arm, put nose to the fold and carry out a fairly hygienic sleeve sneeze when one is called for. No, they just look forward, release their wet, nasty germs like face geysers and proceed to touch all the books, pencils, toys, doorknobs, teachers and friends they can get their hands on.
Early childhood education doesn’t prepare us for winter in the Midwest. You’ve probably never seen a child sitting palm to face, taking a big lick and then running that palm over his nose to the top of his head. Oh, yes. It does happen. It happens as the child right next to him is pretending to look at something on the floor, picking his nose under a cupped hand thinking nobody knows that he’s actually picking his nose. If he doesn’t look at us, we can’t see him.
An article in the Journal/Sentinel this morning urges parents to teach children good snot etiquette and implores us to keep children’s hands clean. This poses a particular problem in schools with 16 sinks for 600 kids. There is no soundproofing, of course, so if there are more than about 2 kids in the bathroom at one time, a staff member ends up kicking them out because they’re too loud. We would have 36 kids at each pedestal with the charge of coming out with clean hands in about 5 minutes. That gives them about 8 seconds apiece to stretch over the sink, figure out how to turn the water on, push the soap dispenser, rub their hands together as they sing the ABC Song, rinse, dry and get back to class. When I went to visit Japanese schools, I was distractingly fascinated with their 20’ long sinks, with water flow available for about 15 kids at a time. These were not in the bathrooms, these were along the halls. Very efficient.
Some may be wondering why the hand sanitizer thing doesn’t work. Have you ever seen a six year old with a bottle of liquid soap? They are more interested in watching the liquid streaming out than in getting a workable amount of dollop. Left to their own, kids use about ¼ of a bottle at a time, hold up their shiny slick hands while the sanitizer drips onto the tables, books and carpeting as they tromp through the room in their boots. If teachers do it for them, they aren’t available to help kids with the long list of needs they seem to come up with just before the lunch bell rings.
So folks please, tell your kids that if they lick their lips and it doesn’t feel like lip they should get a tissue and then throw said tissue away instead of leaving it on the tabletop. Teach them that when they are talking to someone and they have to sneeze, they need to change aim. There is no early childhood teacher alive who has not had his or her face completely sprayed with the sneeze of an oblivious student. If you want to be sure your kids wash hands before eating, you may want to give them those packaged hand wipes that rib places hand out. They love opening the things, unfolding and wiping their hands with them. Marketers ought to run with this attraction and start printing jokes or putting cartoon characters in the middle of the towel that disappear as the child wipes. When the image is gone, hands are clean. Why doesn’t anybody ask us? Another idea would be to have a big tank of soapy water in the cafeteria. Kids go in and get to put each hand in to reach the bottom of the tank. Small plastic prizes will be there as incentive, or maybe quarters depending on what school district you’re in. Bottom line is, adults, we’re in this alone. The kids just don’t care.
Little snots.
