Wash your hands the Rufus way

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The Rufus handwashing programme has been developed with childcare professionals to teach children about good handwashing habits.

Rufus our handwashing hero teaches kids about good handwashing practice at home – especially how important it is to wash hands for 20 seconds and to dry them properly.

Proper handwashing means following these five steps:

1. Wash
2. Soap
3. Rub between fingers, thumbs and all parts of the hands for at least 20 seconds
4. Rinse
5. Dry

Sing the handwashing song

To help children memorise these steps, sing the Rufus song with RTÉjr’s Clara Murray. Repeat it two to three times to make sure your hands are clean.

You can also read the Rufus story book. Get the story book here - it's available in Irish, English, Polish and Ukranian.

Story time with Clara

Sink poster

Print it out this sink poster to remind kids to follow the five steps.

Print out the sink poster

An póstaer as Gaeilge

Handwashing - the Rufus way

Here’s a Rufus animation which reminds us of the five steps – wash, soap, rub, rinse and dry.

Colouring sheets

Your little ones can colour in our Rufus colouring sheets.

Colour in a sink poster | Colour in Rufus

Character cut-outs

Here’s some of the story book characters to cut out and make into puppets to create new adventures for Rufus and friends

Character cut-outs Sheet 1 | Character cut-outs Sheet