Safety, Health, and Nutrition in Early Childhood Education

Paris, J. (2018). Safety, Health, and Nutrition in Early Childhood Education. College of the Canyons. https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/textbooks/safety-health-and-nutrition-in-early-Childhood-education
Reviewed by: Ang Lama, Lehman College

Introduction

This evaluation is on Safety, Health, Nutrition in Early Childhood Education, a book composed of information regarding safety, health, and nutrition in early childhood education as the title implies. The book is broken down into four sections (1. Introduction; 2. Safety; 3. Health; 4. Nutrition), and each section has multiple chapters which go into detail about the topics addressed. The author is Jennifer Paris who is a full-time faculty member of the Early Childhood Education Department at College of the Canyons and has over a decade of experience in the field. Overall, the book is quite comprehensive and detailed. The textbook can be used to support the topics taught in a class on early childhood education. The contents in the book are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY).  A Creative Commons license is a global license in which the author gives anyone the right to share and adapt the contents in the book as long as the necessary guidelines are met.

Evaluation

Content: The content in the book is quite comprehensive and goes into many different aspects of early childhood education. The language is easy to understand and can be read by a high schooler without much assistance. The book doesn’t use hard-to-understand words or terms which you have to look up every few sentences. Any term in need of an explanation has one. The contents are also accurate and each chapter has a box for “Resources for Further Explanation,” which is helpful in case anyone needs more information to comprehend the topic. There are tips included throughout the book to help the reader apply the information learned in the real world. For example, on page 59 under the Safety section, there is a purple text box on biting. The text box has a helpful tip for what to do when a child bites another child and how to respond to it, “Intervene immediately between the child who bit and the bitten child. Stay calm don’t overreact, yell or give a lengthy explanation … Encourage the child who bit to help the other child by getting the ice pack, etc” (Paris, 2018). The different chapters throughout the four different sections go into detail and successfully provide comprehensive information about the topic. For example, Section Two is about Safety and has five chapters on preventing injury, creating a safe space indoors and in outdoor environments, prepping for emergencies, and child maltreatment. Now, if we look further ahead in the book, there are health and safety checklists, injury report forms, playground inspection forms, and emergency response plans which are great supplemetal resources that the author uses throughout her book to support the information provided in the different sections of the book.

Structure, Organization & Technical: The book is divided into chapters and the way the chapters are structured is quite easy to follow. The fonts and formatting of the information are easy to read and not distracting to the reader. The content flows clearly throughout the book as everything is broken down into sections and is also color-coded. Since the book is available in either pdf or google docs, the book can be read regardless of the device used as a laptop or iPhone the reader can use either to read the book well without having to zoom or struggle with it. In terms of printing the book in black and white, there may be some problems with the colored boxes used. The colors used throughout the book are quite dark in some cases and can affect the clearness of the text. She uses teal, dark purple, muted purple, dark green, and muted green. So, if she chose a lighter shade of the color and stuck to just teal, purple, and green as her three colors for the book then the book would be less distracting and a lot easier to read in black and white.

Images & Interactive Features: The images and boxes are placed well throughout the book. There is a considerable amount of space in between them, the only thing I would say is if the images are slightly bigger in some cases then that would help the reader see it more clearly. Also, some images are pixelated, and if they were replaced with a more clear picture then when printing the book, the images will come out more clearly. Other than that, the images and boxes information used to help keep the reader engaged and also give more context to the information written. The author also makes good use of alternative text for images. Although the book is comprehensive, it is not overeating to read and is easy to understand with the pictures and boxes of texts

Social Justice & Equity: Although the images used throughout the book show children of diverse races, ethnicity, and cultural backgrounds, the author and contributors to the book are not at all diverse. However, the author does try to be culturally sensitive and use language that is not stereotypical. Real-world examples are given throughout the book which makes the reader easy to understand the topics. The author also provides examples and information including the BIPOC community and doesn’t exclude them from topics or discussions. For example, on page 13 there is a purple box about the effects of poverty on education. Within the box, the author states, “this gap disproportionately affects Black and Latinx children” (Paris, 2018). The author tries her best to be representative of all backgrounds and the issues they might face.

Accessibility: The text used is inclusive and inviting to readers of all backgrounds and easy to understand. The book can be converted into a different format and downloaded. The book is available in a google doc so it makes it easy to rearrange or add information if needed. The author does provide her information at the beginning of the book, along with a link to a survey and a google group in case there are any errors or additions someone wants to make to the book. All the images also have texts below to describe the image and give more context. The author does use multiple different colors which can be distracting and if the author stuck to a few lighter options then it would make the book more visually appealing, and easy to read if printed in black and white.

Supplemental Materials: At the end of some chapters there are interactive checklists or questions that help the reader keep in mind what they’ve learned through the chapter and apply it to the real world.

Overall Review

Overall, the book is easy to understand and accessible to all readers. The information is always backed by an image or a box of text to further explain the information and allows the reader to apply the information in real-world situations. The text is also diverse and is inclusive of the BIPOC community and uses inclusive language to convey the topic. The book is also broken down into smaller chapters and the chapters are structured well enough that the text easily flows from one page to another. Although the colors used can be distracting, the author makes good use of them by color-coding different boxes of information making it easy for the reader to take a break in between information and be able to separate them. I would most definitely recommend this book. I would recommend it to Early Childhood Education, and Dietetics, Food, and Nutrition students who will highly benefit from it, the information in the book goes along with the information taught in the classes so having this book on hand will provide them with a helpful informative resource to use. Also, anyone who is interested in the topic will benefit from the well-structured information and not be overwhelmed.