Beach After School Safety Workshops

Purpose
The purpose of this study was to learn how best to present safety information on various topics of injury prevention in a fun and challenging after school program to elementary school children. Fifteen fourth and fifth grade students were recruited from several classrooms at one elementary school to participate in seven weekly after school safety workshops. The students were given pre and post surveys consisting of 14 questions to determine their level of knowledge in four topic areas.

A combination of expert presentations from Injury Free Coalition for Kids members andapplied and experiential learning methods were used to teach students safety information in four topic areas: dog bites, traffic safety, fire safety, poison safety, and safe play. In addition the students learned how to use digital cameras and Powerpoint® software to present a summary of safety knowledge in a final classroom presentation.

Results
Overall test scores improved from a mean of 9.2 (65%; standard deviation 2.0) correct answers on the pre test to 12.5 (90%; standard deviation 1.7) on the post-test (paired t-test p < 0.001). The largest improvement in test scores was demonstrated in the safe play 125%, fire safety 39%, traffic safety 31%, and dog bite safety 13% topic areas. Mean scores for poison safety declined by 5%