Effectiveness assessment of food education among preschool children, parents and educators

• Main Authors: Susana Rodrigo-Cano, José Miguel Soriano, Joaquín Aldas-Manzano
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Academia Española de Nutrición y Dietética 2016-01-01
• Series: Revista Española de Nutrición Humana y Dietética
• Subjects: Educación; Niño preescolar; Dieta; Hábitos alimentarios; Dieta Mediterránea; Educadores de la salud.
• Online Access: http://renhyd.org/index.php/renhyd/article/view/182

Introduction: Childhood is the period in which risk factors that can start food diseases in adults are developed. Therefore this is the appropriate moment to set up the values of a healthy diet. The main aim of this study was to evaluate the adherence to the Mediterranean Diet in children and also the knowledge about healthy habits in children, parents and teachers before and after food education intervention as well as evaluating its effectiveness. Material and Methods: Cross-sectional study that included 94 students aged between 3 and 6 years old, 12 parents and 8 teachers. The level of healthy habits knowledge was determined with ad hoc questionnaires for all of them whereas the adherence to the Mediterranean Diet was determined with the Quality Test of the Mediterranean Diet on Childhood and Adolescence in children. Results: It has been reached a significant increase in global healthy habits knowledge (t=-6.29; p<0.001), in how often they have to eat (t=-2.35; p<0.05), as well as in fruit (t=-3.92; p<0.01), vegetables (t=-2.35; p<0.05) and fish (t=-7.42; p<0.001) frequency intake in parents and also in physical activities knowledge (t=-2.58; p<0.05) in children. Moreover, children’s parents with more adhesion to the Mediterranean Diet improved their healthy habits knowledge significantly (ρ=0.75; p<0.01). Conclusions: Education interventions for children, parents and educators are necessary in order to increase healthy food knowledge. With food education interventions is possible to get a significant improvement in the parents’ knowledge, the main responsible for their children feeding.