ABSTRACT
This study has developed a learning kit for the prevention of domestic burns in childhood. The main objective was to trial an educational package for children (nursery and primary classes), for the prevention of burns, to be implemented through education in schools. The educational kit comprises posters, information leaflets, comic books, and pre and post education evaluation materials for school children, parents and teachers. Recipients of the preliminary study were the students of nine schools in the eight Italian cities where Burn Centers are located. In order to reach the target groups of children, it was necessary to identify the most effective communication strategy to convey the burn prevention message. For nursery school children, it was not possible to use tools with written texts alone, as they were not yet literate. Moreover, even for older children, it was necessary to find an attractive tool to catch their attention and interest, promoting the understanding and memorization of lessons learned. The most suitable means was found to be comic strips, allowing the messages to be conveyed through images as well as words. A total of 370 children (195 from nurseries and 175 from primary schools) participated in the trial of the educational kit. Overall, for every environment represented in the evaluation table, the ability to recognize the dangers among both the pre-school and primary school children increased significantly after the training activity. In conclusion, the educational kit has been positively assessed.
Cette étude a permis de mettre au point un kit d'apprentissage pour la prévention des brûlures domestiques chez les enfants. L'objectif principal était d'expérimenter un ensemble éducatif pour enfants (crèches et écoles primaires), pour la prévention des brûlures, à mettre en oeuvre à travers des actions d'éducation dans les écoles. Le kit éducatif est composé de posters, de brochures d'information, de bandes dessinées, et d'un matériel d'évaluation pré et post enseignements, pour enfants, parents et enseignants. Cette'étude préliminaire a rassemblé les élèves de 9 écoles, appartenant aux 8 villes des Centres de grands brûles en Italie. Concernant l'éducation des enfants, il était nécessaire d'identifier la stratégie de communication la plus efficace pour leur transmettre les messages de prévention. Pour les élèves de maternelle, il n'a pas été possible d'utiliser des outils avec textes, puisqu'ils n'étaient pas encore capables de lire et écrire; en outre, même pour les enfants plus âgés, il était nécessaire de trouver un outil attrayant pour attirer leur attention et susciter leur intérêt, promouvoir la compréhension et la mémorisation des leçons apprises. La bande dessinée a été jugée l'outil le plus approprié (langage complexe qui utilise l'outil verbal et les codes iconiques).Au total, 195 enfants de maternelle et 175 d'écoles primaires ont participé à l'évaluation du kit pédagogique. Nos résultats démontrent que, pour chaque environnement représenté dans le tableau d'évaluation, la capacité à reconnaître les dangers a augmenté d'une manière significative après la formation aussi bien dans le groupe des élèves de maternelle que dans celui des élèves d'écoles primaires. En conclusion, le kit pédagogique a été évalué positivement.
ABSTRACT
In the last years an extremely rapid massive diffusion of the cell phones is occurred. Currently in Italy, as in many other countries, almost all the youngsters and a lot of adults possess a cell phones. This device is enormously useful, but its use can determine negative effects on the user's attention, i.e. during vehicle driving. Numerous epidemiological studies show that cell phone use in driving determines a relative risk of causing a road accident around 4 (equivalent to driving with 0.8 g/l blood alcohol concentration), for both hands-held and hands-free devices. This risk doesn't seem well perceived from the Italian drivers: as our surveys show, the 2.5% of them use a cellular hands-held while driving. This situation appears to evolve toward more critical conditions, given the quick diffusion of ever more technologically advanced instruments, such as video-cell phones, mostly capable of capturing the attention, or TV-cell phones, with which the distracting occasions could be more frequent and prolonged. The use of the cell phone seems to imply an important risk for pedestrians: the first results of the monitoring results that we are producing on this matter in Rome show that the 5.5% of the pedestrians cross the road while talking with a hands-held cell phones, in the most of cases ignoring the traffic conditions at all. All this facts show the urgency to promote specific actions of prevention, in absence of which it is reasonable to foresee a consistent growth in the number of road traffic accidents. In our opinion it is necessary to capillarily inform the public of the signalled risks, possibly also in the advertising spaces of the producers and managers of the cellular telephony, apart obvious repressive actions on the use of the cell phones during the guide of a vehicle.
