Designing web-based learning opportunities for children related to health care (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Hospitalisation is a significant and stressful experience for children and parents which may cause both short-term and long-term negative consequences. Web-based preparation programmes to reduce these stressful experiences that encompass children’s learning processes should help information exchange and understanding. The Anaesthesia-Web was created to meet the needs of children and parents when preparing for anaesthesia and surgery. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to elucidate key educational principles when designing web-sites for children and parents in the health care context. METHODS A directed qualitative content analysis was applied to illuminate and explain prerequisites for learning on the Anaesthesia-Web. The educational concepts of pre-understanding, motivation, learning processes and the outcome of learning were used to analyse the learning possibilities of the Anaesthesia-Web for children prior to contact with health care. RESULTS Four themes characterising children´s learning opportunities on the Anaesthesia-Web were found in the analysis: "In charge of my own learning"; "Discover and play"; "Recognise and identify” and "Getting feedback". The analysis showed that the Anaesthesia-Web offers children control and enables use of the web-site based on interest and ability. This is important in terms of motivation and each child’s individual pre-understanding. Through discovery and play children can receive, process, and apply the information on the Anaesthesia-Web cognitively, emotionally and by active participation. Play stimulates motivation and is very important in the child’s learning process. When facing hospitalisation, children need to develop trust, and feel safe so that they can focus on learning. On the Anaesthesia-Web children can recognise situations and feelings and can find someone with whom to identify. Several features on the web-site promote feedback which is necessary to judge the learning achievements, confirm understanding and the need for repetition. CONCLUSIONS Web-based preparation programs are important health care learning resources for children and parents. Content and design need to change from simply providing information to embracing the importance of the child’s need to process information to learn and fully understand. By developing web-based preparation programs that include educational principles, web-based technology can be used to its fullest advantage as a health care learning resource for children and parents. The four educational themes described in this study should help future similar website developments.