Intestinal worms affect millions of children worldwide.
Older children can learn and share knowledge about the life cycle of intestinal worms, the available treatments for worms and what they can do to prevent the chances of worm infestation like good hygiene practices and wearing shoes.
Use the message tabs to the left to read our Top Ten Messages on Intestinal Worms for children to learn and share. Scroll down to see ideas on what children can do to understand, find out more, take action and reflect on this topic.
Download our 100 Messages PDF to have a copy of all our messages for printing and sharing. View our Intestinal Worms messages in Many Languages and download some FREE Resources associated with this topic.
Millions of children have worms living inside their body, in a part called ‘the intestines’ this is where the food we eat is digested by our bodies.
Most worms live in a part of our body called the large intestine. This is where our bodies work hard to take the nutrients out of our food, leaving waste that comes out of our body as poo and water that comes out of our body as pee. Having worms is very common. As many as 1.5 billion people in the world have worms in their bodies right now. That is the same as one person in every four.
Different kinds of worms can live in our bodies like roundworm, whipworm, hookworm and bilharzia (schistosomiasis). There are others too!
Roundworms are very common. The female can grow up to 40cm long and can make 2000 eggs every day. Pin worms live in our intestine. They make our bottoms itch because this is where they come out to lay eggs. Hookworms attach themselves to our intestines and drink our blood. Five hookworms can drink one spoonful of blood every day. Imagine how weak you would feel if you had 100 hookworms drinking your blood? Schistomaisis worms live in water snails. They burrow into our feet and legs if we drink or play in water where the snails live.
Worms can make us feel ill or weak and they can cause stomach aches, coughs, fever and sickness.
When worms live in our bodies they eat our food and drink our blood. They can leave us feeling tired and unwell. They can stop us growing as quickly as we should and also make it hard for us to concentrate on our work at school. We might have worms if our bottom feels itchy, if our tummy hurts or if we have lost our appetite – but most people don’t even know they have worms.
Worms live inside your body so you might not know they are there but sometimes you can see worms in your poo.
Sometimes you can see pin worms because they come out of your bottom at night and lay their eggs making your bottom itchy. You might see them in your poo. If you scratch your bottom you can spread the worm eggs to other people. Children who have a lot of worms in their bodies sometimes have big stomachs, but most children don’t know they have worms. They may have tummy ache, or feel dizzy if they have hookworms, or lose their appetite. Another kind of worm called Guinea worm makes a lump on your leg and the worm has to be pulled out. It’s very painful, but becoming rarer as people are working hard all over the world to get rid of Guinea worms forever.
Worms and their eggs get into our bodies in different ways: some get in from food or drink (like unsafe water). Others get in through bare feet.
To protect ourselves from getting worms we must wash our hands with soap and water after using the toilet, before eating and after cleaning up after a younger child has had a poo. We must always wash vegetables before we eat them or cook them with clean water and only drink water we know is safe to drink. Some worms like to get into our bodies through our feet so we must remember to always wear our sandals when playing outside and especially when we use the toilet. Some worm eggs live in water and we get these worms when we play in or drink dirty water – these worms live in snails and give us an illness called bilharzia which some people call Schistomaisis.
Killing worms with ‘de-worming’ treatment is easy and cheap. It’s given by health workers every 6 or 12 months or more for some worms.
It’s hard to know if we have worms. That’s why we get de-worming medicine at school or go to the health clinic to treat them once or twice every year with our families. De-worming medicine is safe. It kills any worms and their eggs that are in your body. It treats them once and it doesn’t stop you getting them again, that is why it is important to wash your hands before eating and after using the toilet, wash vegetables before eating them raw or cooking them and only drinking water that is clean and safe to drink.
Worm eggs live in pee and poo. Use latrines or get rid of pee and poo safely. Wash your hands with soap after you pee or poo, and if you help someone younger, so worm eggs don’t get on your hands.
Worm eggs live in poo. If we always use a latrine worm eggs can’t get into the soil and don’t get onto our hands or onto our food. Animals have worms too, so we need to keep them and their poo away from the house and away from our drinking water. We need to wash our hands with soap and water after a pee or poo and help younger children to remember to wash their hands after having a pee or poo so they don’t get worms.
Stop worms getting into your body by washing hands with soap after a pee or poo, washing fruit and vegetables, before preparing food, eating or drinking and by wearing shoes.
If we remember to keep our hands clean we can protect ourselves from worms. Worms only live in poo, we can’t catch them from someone else. So if we remember to wash fruit and vegetables before we eat them and remember to always wash our hands with soap and water after using the toilet, playing outside or touching animals and before eating, then we can stop worms getting into our body. If we remind each other to wash our hands and food and if we take de-worming medicine once or twice a year, we can stop worms infecting us.
Some worms live in the soil – so always wash your hands with soap after touching soil.
When someone has worms the worms make eggs and the eggs come out in their poo. The eggs are so tiny we can’t see them. If we don’t use a toilet but poo in the bush, worm eggs can get into the soil. The eggs in the soil get onto our hands and bare feet when we play outside and they get dirty. Eggs can get onto vegetables from the dirt they grow in.
When watering plants to eat, make sure you use water that cannot have human pee or poo in it.
When we grow vegetables we must keep the vegetable garden free from our poo. We need to use water that hasn’t got our pee or poo in because this will put worm eggs into the soil. The worm eggs in the soil get onto the vegetables and when we harvest and eat them, the worm eggs can get into us. So keep the vegetable garden clear of pee and poo and use clean water to water produce.
Visit our blog for more news, resource launches and info about health education and children’s participation or Join Our Community to ensure you never miss a thing!
MAKE our own Intestinal Worms Messages using our own words in our own language!
LEARN these messages so we never forget them!
ADD these messages to our collection!
SHARE these messages with other children and our families!
USE ‘vote with your feet’ to take our quiz and find out how much you know about worms.
WATCH the video about Schistomaisis and find out more about worms in dirty water.
PLAY a word game to fill in the blanks to test our knowledge about worms.
LISTEN to a story about worms so we can understand how we can stop worms spreading by washing our hands and remembering to wear our sandals.
LISTEN to the story about Pate kay Keeray.
FIND out how food is prepared in our school and how our cook keeps food safe and free from worms.
WATCH the video ‘Dirty word of the day – all about worms’!
ALWAYS use the toilet or latrine to stop worm eggs spreading from poo that gets into the soil and water.
WASHING our hands needs soap and water, find out how to wash our hands.
TAKE a quiz to find out if we know when to wash our hands before doing something and when to wash our hands after doing something.
DO a survey to find out what people in our family know about worms.
LISTEN to a story about Meena or read the comic book about how Meena learns about worms.
WATCH the video about our digestive system.
WATCH a video about how to clean water so that it is safe using sunlight.
MAKE up a play about wicked worms and how children stop wicked worms stealing their family’s food!
MAKE posters to show how to keep food safe and free from worms by washing it before eating raw vegetables, cooking meat properly and preparing food.
FIND out how to make a Tippy Tap and make a hand washing station for our class to use.
MAKE a song about how to stop worms spreading.
MAKE up a song about hand washing to remind us when and how to wash our hands.
MAKE a poster to remind us to wash vegetables and fruit before we eat them or prepare them.
MAKE a role play or puppet show about how we can stop worms spreading.
HOW does the food we eat get used by our bodies?
HOW long is our large intestine?
HOW do worms take our food?
HOW long can a tape worm grow?
HOW many types of worm do you know?
WHAT kind of worms are most common where you live?
WHAT are the signs you could have worms?
WHERE you can get de-worming medicine and who needs to take it? (Everyone in your family!)
HOW many eggs can a worm make every day?
WORMS may take other nutrients like Vitamin A from our bodies as well as food – can you find out what we need Vitamin A for?
WORM babies are called larvae. Which worm larvae get into our bodies through our skin?
HOW using the toilet or latrine and getting rid of our poo safely helps stop worms spreading?
WHEN our school de-worming days are?
WHY does everyone get de-worming tablets on the same day?
HOW many children in the world have worms?
WHY is it important we stop worms spreading?
ABOUT our digestive system – how does it work and what do worms do to stop it working?
HOW small is a worm egg? What is the smallest thing you know?
HOW can we tell if water is clean or dirty?
WHAT do plants need to grow? How can we make fertilizer that is safe to feed to plants?
When teaching children these messages, it can be hard to hold their interest in the topic and keep energy up. For ideas on keeping children engaged and excited, look at Closing Games & Activities.