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Dealing with Head Lice at School

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Head lice at school. Hearing those words makes a teacher shudder. Every school seems to have their own take on how to deal with head lice. I’ve worked at schools where students were immediately sent home until all the nits were gone. Another school allowed students to stay in school with live lice. Yet another school allowed students to return with nits, but not with live lice. 

Let me start by saying this – I am NOT a doctor. (Obviously, right?) But I AM a teacher. And I just happen to be a teacher who dealt with head lice on 50 different occasions in one school year. One student had is 40 times. Seriously. At that point, I quit counting. I know he had it more, but it wasn’t worth counting. Sigh.

I saw parents shave their students head at the first word of a lice outbreak taking place within their child’s school. Teachers would scramble to find creative ways to keep the lice away from other children, while ensuring not to exclude the child who had the lice. The younger the students, the harder this can be! (I know – the year I was talking about above? I was teacher Kinders. Another sigh from me her.) 

So what is a teacher to do when they hear of lice in the school – or worse, their own classroom?

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Find Out District PolicyWarning - Picture for Dealing with Head Lice at School

Find out what your district’s policy is on head lice at school. As stated above, you may be required to send a child home, or they may be allowed to stay in your classroom.
 
Also find out if you are supposed to send a letter home with the entire class. Again, this was policy in one school I was at. However, I’ve also seen where that is against policy. Find out before you make the mistake either way.
 
See if there is an assigned person who is checking for head lice at school. Many schools are lucky enough to have a nurse who does this, but I have not always been this fortunate. Sometimes a school secretary or another person will take on this duty since they have a little more flexibility in their schedule, but it is often left up to the teacher. If that’s the case, have some gloves on hand. 🙂

Prevention

If you have some comfy pillows or blankets in your classroom that students frequently use, you may want to bag them up for a few days until the outbreak is gone. Lice can’t live long periods of time off the human body, but since students’ heads will be in direct contact with these items – I’d rather be safe than sorry! (However, many will say you do not need to clean in any way. It’s your choice, so I recommend doing more research on the subject.)
 
The main way lice get from one student to another is through head-to-head contact. For those of you who teach young elementary students, you know this happens a LOT. If appropriate (and in accordance with district policy), let your students know that there is a lice outbreak at the school. Explain that they must keep their heads away from one another to keep the lice away. If you can’t openly discuss the lice, keep in mind the types of activities you are doing. Try not to do activities where students’ heads are right next to each other. Yes, I realize this is easier said than done.
 
As a personal note to other teachers, I once learned that lice only like clean hair. I worked with a paraprofessional that kept a bottle of hairspray in our classroom closet for that very reason. The minute she heard there were lice somewhere in the school, you can bet she was dousing her head! It cracked me up, but she never did have lice that I’m away of. 

Clean Up

There is a lot of conflicting information out there. However – if you’re like me – you’re going to feel the need to clean your classroom when you find out there has been lice occurring. But many experts will say that excessive washing and cleaning is not necessary. Again, do your own research, but I want to share a couple little things I did in my classroom when we had lice.
 
Like I mentioned above, I put away the cloth items as much as possible. While this may not have been necessary, it didn’t hurt my students to go without their “extra” items for a few days. No one needs a pillow in order to enjoy the reading corner.
 
We also did a general clean. Any surface that we normally wiped off got a good wash. My paraprofessional and I also went out of our way to wipe down other surfaces.
 
Finally, I bought this lice spray. It’s supposed to be used on items you can’t wash, like that adorable chair you put in your classroom last year. Again, many of the website you’ll read say there’s no need to do this type of cleaning and work, but I figured it wasn’t going to hurt me to give the room a light spraying before I walked out for the day.
 
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There you have it! That’s how I dealt with head lice at school. Clearly I am NOT a doctor or your school administrator, so please act according to school policy and what your own health care professional, school nurse, or county health nurse recommends. 
I know everyone has their own way, but that’s what worked for me. Thank goodness I never had head lice myself, and we were able to keep the lice from spreading to other students. 
 
Please share your methods with us in the comments below so we can all learn from one another!

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