COVID-19 has brought new awareness to the idea that you should not touch your face when you’re sick. This is good policy, not just for when we’re facing this disease, but any. Not touching your face can be harder than it seems, though. Try out your self-control with this fun family game!

Don’t Face It!

INTRODUCE

• EXPLAIN: COVID-19 is making our lives a little crazy these days! But there are simple things that we can do to stop it ourselves, no matter how old we are! And you can make it into a fun time, instead of being quite so boring.
• ASK: What do you know that you can do to stop the spread of the virus?
• EXPLAIN: One thing you can do is to avoid touching your face. And we’re going to make following these directions more fun!

 EXPLORE

• EXPLAIN: Viruses live on the inside of us. But the inside can get outside when we rub our eyes, noses, or mouths, lick our fingers, pick our nose (ewww!), sneeze, or cough. And when we get germs on our fingers, that means we can get them onto other things, too.
• ASK: What are all the things you touch in a day?
• EXPLAIN: One way we can avoid spreading germs is not to touch our faces. This is SUPER hard! In fact, scientists think people touch their face 2000-3000 times PER DAY and 20-25 times PER HOUR.
• INSTRUCT:
  • Get a piece of paper.
  • Put the names of everyone in your house on the paper.
  • For one day, track how many times each person touches their face.
  • If you want to, you can make it more of a game, by asking people to donate a penny every 10 times they touch their faces, or a second of time for every time. Or the person who touches their face the least wins a little prize!
  • You can play the game each day to see who wins, and if you can help train yourself and your family to stop touching their faces as much!

CONNECT

• DISCUSS: What are other ways you can help yourself and your family stay safe from corona!