Wash hands
Thirty seconds at the sink hide four steps that easily blur into one: the right temperature, enough soap, scrubbing long enough, drying properly. The visual support below separates them so the child can see what comes next.
♂Washing hands in sink
A person is washing hands with soap under running water in a sink.
♂Hands under faucet with soap
A pair of hands under running water from a faucet, with soap foam and water drops.
♂Wash hands
Illustration of hands washing with soap under running water from a tap.
♂Wash hands
A boy washes his hands at the sink with soap and running water.
♀Washing hands in sink
A person is washing hands with soap under running water in a sink.
♀Wash hands
A girl washing her hands with soap and water from a tap.
♀Wash hands
Illustration of a girl washing her hands with soap and water at a sink.
About this visual support
Hand washing looks like one task but is really four: setting the water, picking up soap, scrubbing, and drying. When a child hears wash your hands as a single instruction, the soap step often gets skipped and the towel ends up barely touched. You notice it later, on sticky door handles and on whatever the next snack happens to be.
Pictures next to the tap give each step a face. The child can glance at the temperature card and adjust, point to the soap to remember it, count scrubs against their palms, and finish at the towel. You are not adding more words. You are leaving four anchor points in the room so the routine works even when you are not standing there.
A practical tip: laminate the cards and hang them at the child's eye level, not yours. The short person is the one using them. If you want to chain hand washing into bigger routines, before meals or after the toilet, Routined lets you stack steps and run a timer for the scrubbing seconds.