BURN PREVENTION PROGRAMS FOR CHILDREN - ARE THEY EFFECTIVE

A project was designed to evaluate fire safety knowledge in a population of 67 school children aged 8 to 13 yr, and how a lecture on burn and fire prevention affected this prior knowledge. The project consisted of four major parts: (a) a prelecture test presenting 9 questions related to important and frequently encountered situations occurring during burn accidents; (b) presentation of a multimedia lecture on burn and fire prevention the same day of the pre-lecture test; (c) a post-lecture test, using the same questions as the pre-lecture test, administered to the same student population one week after the lecture presentation; and (d) analysis and discussion of the results with the students and subsequent reinforcement of correct behaviours related to fire prevention. The results of the project demonstrated that prior knowledge and behaviour related to burn and fire prevention was deficient for this population and that the multimedia lecture was an efficient educational tool. However, the results also pointed out that some misinterpretations resulted from the lecture, as seen by inconsistent answers, mainly due to the common failure of safety education programmes to understand the child's point of view and his particular cognitive development. These results emphasize the necessity for the development of burn prevention programmes which take into account the child's perception of his world, his uniqueness and his cognitive and moral development; and, secondly, the absolute necessity for evaluating these programmes. © 1979.