Effectiveness of Different Instructional Methods in Imparting Knowledge about Nutrition Concepts among Culinary Arts Students

The problem: Many nutrition courses for culinary arts students are theoretical in nature. Students are not taught how to translate knowledge about nutrition into practice. Combining educational theories and nutrition research with cooking applications through nutrition education programs for culinarians are key for long-term successful menu changes. Intervention: Culinary arts students were randomized to receive either traditional lecture (C), demonstration (DP), online lecture capture (OP), and the combination of (OP+DP) intervention. Design: this randomized controlled trial comparing the relative effectiveness of the four instructional methods Sample: A convenience sample of n= 139 culinary arts students was randomized to receive either the C, DP, OP or OP+DP intervention in imparting knowledge about nutrition concepts. Analysis: A survey was administered at pre-test, post-test and at an 8-week follow-up. ANOVA was used to detect if there were statistically significant differences on any of the four survey subscales. Results: There was no statistically significant difference in performance between DP, OP and OP+DP groups on each subscale. However, each of these methods performed significantly better than the traditional lecture. (α≤ 0.05) was considered significant when conducting hypotheses tests. Conclusion: All methods were superior to traditional lecture. Resultant outcomes were higher as compared to pre-intervention status