Teachers are trying to rub out a dangerous new fad called “Eraser Challenge.” According to reports, in the Eraser Challenge, students take an eraser and rub it back and forth across their arm while reciting the alphabet and coming up with a word of each letter.
Once they get to the Z, they stop and show off their reddened skin to friends. School officials are sending home letters warning parents about the eraser game, calling it a “troubling” activity that teens across the country have been getting involved in.
One principal said he first found out about the game after several students told the school’s nurse they had marks on their arms after playing the game.
“When I found out that kids were sharing erasers, so as they broke the skin they were passing the eraser off to someone else, body fluids being shared, that was a huge concern of mine,” one school official said.
Please take the time to talk to your children about this to make sure they are not involved in this ridiculous and unsafe act. One student said she has seen many of her classmates play the game, mostly in the hallways. The girl said playing the game never appealed to her. “They were like, ‘oh it stinks so bad’, but they just kept going.”
Videos that have popped up on YouTube show the eraser challenge being played mostly by six, seventh and eighth graders. Doctors say the rubbing can leave scars on the skin and cause infections. Emergency rooms have seen an increase in children coming in for treatments of their wounds.
