We all know that washing your hands is important in the fight against the spread of sickness. Plus, kids' hands are always just so gross. Teachers know this all too well as they deal with our children every school day and see the flu and colds spread through their classrooms. One Idaho teacher recently used bread to show how dirty and germ covered our hands, and other common items, really are.

Jarralee Metcalf, a teacher in the Bonneville School District, did this moldy bread science experiment with her elementary school kids. For the experiment she took one untouched piece of bread and placed it in a Ziploc bag. She then took another piece of bread and had the children touch it without washing their hands. With another piece they used hand sanitized and another piece they touched after washing with soap and water. For the final piece of bread they rubbed it on the classroom computers - I know, gross. The results are pretty interesting and took a few weeks to see real effects. What can be learned from the study? Our computers are disgusting and even with hand sanitizer our hands are still pretty gross. I'm actually surprised that the hands washed with soap almost had no effect on the bread. So, my takeaway is that my kids need to actually wash their hands instead of using sanitizer so often and calling it clean.

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