Germs & Infection

Today we continued our study of germs (or microbes) and infection. We went to Brain Pop Jr. (www.brainpopjr.com) and watched a video about why it is important to wash your hands. (It is found under Health, then Be Well, then Washing Hands.) After the video, you can take a quiz, see a cartoon, draw about it, read about it (short book list), write about it, etc. There are just lots of good ideas there! And, there are also some great ideas to try under "Ideas for Grown Ups."

Later, we played some games at the American Museum of Natural History's website. They have an area called "Infection Detection Protection." There are 7 activities there, and so far we've done 3 of them.

"Meet the Microbes" talks about the difference between viruses, bacteria, and protozoa.

"Bacteria in the Cafeteria" is a game where you click on different blue stars in the cafeteria and they tell you about different bacteria. You decide if they are helpful or not.

"Infection" was probably our favorite. You get to pick which virus you want to be. Then, you try to get past a body's defenses. You "roll" and then move your piece. It might say "You were sneezed out. Go back to Start" or "You got into the blood stream. Move ahead 4 spaces." We never got anywhere close to winning. It really shows how hard it is for germs actually to get into your body and make you sick.

We plan at looking at the other 4 items in the next couple of days.

Two good books we enjoyed:

• No Measles, No Mumps for Me by Paul Showers
• I Know How We Fight Germs by Kate Rowan - this is a "Sam's Science" book - we've never read any of these before, but Alexandra liked it so much that I've now ordered all the books are library has in this series