In order to visually demonstrate the importance of this valuable life skill to the boys, we:

- got a few slices of bread and got the boys with various levels of hand cleanliness to touch pieces of plain white bread taken from the same loaf on the same day.

- then, we sealed the bread in individual plastic bags to see what would happen one month later.

- we took fresh bread and touched it.

- we did one slice untouched. One with unwashed hands. One with hand sanitiser. One with washed hands with warm water and soap. Then we rubbed a piece on our classroom Chromebooks.

The 'Chromebook' and 'dirty hands' slices are covered in spectacular mould growths resulting from microbial contaminants. Hopefully, the importance of handwashing is now a life-long lesson learned, all thanks to a simple demonstration that seems to have sufficiently grossed them out.

Through this experiment, the boys realised that proper hand hygiene is imperative.