This study aims to look at the effect on the concept of a cooking activity and an unbalanced diet, given that names, features, needs, and cooking usages of vegetables are available through a children’s story-applied cooking activity as an alleviatin...
This study aims to look at the effect on the concept of a cooking activity and an unbalanced diet, given that names, features, needs, and cooking usages of vegetables are available through a children’s story-applied cooking activity as an alleviating program for an unbalanced vegetable diet.
Research questions in this study are as follows:
1. Is there any effect of a cooking activity through a children's story as an alleviating program for an unbalanced vegetable diet in order for children to distinguish vegetables?
2. Is there any effect of a cooking activity through a children's story as an alleviating program for an unbalanced vegetable diet on children's unbalanced diet behaviors?
2-1.What are the effects on children’s unbalancedvegetable diet behaviors evaluated by parents?
2-2.What are the effects on children’s unbalancedvegetable diet behaviors observed by teachers?
The subjects of the study are 30 kindergarten children aged 4 in Y Elementary School associated Kindergarten in Seoul. The following methods were used to investigate a concept of a cooking activity through a children's story and effect as an alleviating program for an unbalanced vegetable diet.
First of all, we selected 5 vegetable-related children’s stories and then we implemented 10 cooking activities using vegetables shown in the stories through 5 weeks during an elective class as a small group. We analyzed the data based on the checklist of an unbalanced diet and behavior developed by Choi, Myung-joo (2002). Moreover, we compared the before- and after- frequency of vegetable distinction and an unbalanced behavior, separately for children and for parents, and we also compared the before-and after- children’s unbalanced diet behaviors observed by teachers during lunchtime.
The findings of this study are as follows:
First, there was a big influence of a cooking activity through a children’s story as an alleviating program for an unbalanced vegetable diet over children for distinguishing vegetables. Specifically, before the activities there were vegetables known to the children such as ‘tomatoes’ (29 subjects), ‘cucumbers’ (29 subjects), ‘carrots’ (26 subjects), ‘radishes’ (23 subjects), and ‘Chinese cabbages’ (21 subjects), followed by ‘leeks’ and ‘peppers’ (19 subjects), ‘green onions’ (15 subjects), ‘cabbages’ (7 subjects), ‘spinach’ (5 subjects) and ‘celery’ (2 subjects). However, after the activities, almost all the subjects were able to distinguish the vegetables, and furthermore the number of subjects who did not know the names of vegetables and had not even seen them decreased from 22 to 0.
Second, a cooking activity through a children’s story as an alleviating program for an unbalanced vegetable diet had a positive effect on children’s unbalanced vegetable diet behaviors. Both behaviors evaluated by parents and those observed by teachers showed that there is an increase in balance among the vegetables, and a decrease in the expression of rejection of disliked vegetables. The changes indicate that a cooking activity through a children’s story as an alleviating program for an unbalanced vegetable diet can have a real effect of diminishing rejection, and thus alleviating children’s unbalanced diet behavior through the experience of the features, need for, and cooking usages of vegetables.