Staff training session- Experiencing children’s field of vision
During the August training session at Kyoto Campus, we experienced seeing things through their field of vision as a part of our training to protect the well-being and safety of the students.
Do you know how wide your field of vision is? According to science, it is said that the average adult has a vision of 150 degrees horizontally and 120 vertically. How about for children?
According to Stina Sandels, a researcher from Sweden, the average six year old has a vision of 90 degrees horizontally and 70 degrees vertically. As children are shorter than adults, a child’s field of vision has a lower range than an adult. We held a training session on how to prevent accidents in the kindergarten at Kyoto Campus in August while experiencing children’s field of vision. The first step is to create a child’s glasses but we added a twist. We put two gloves on our hands and used scissors to simulate how children experience the world.
Using the glasses we made, we crouched down to be closer to the height of an actual child and started exploring around the kindergarten.
Using the glasses we made, we crouched down to be closer to the height of an actual child and started exploring the kindergarten. While walking around and simulating how the children behaved in their everyday lives, the staff were surprised by how narrower our vision was than usual. Usually, going down the stairs takes little thought but we needed to be careful every step. While at the sink, we realized it may not be easy to notice that there is a person next to us. The environment around us seemed like a whole different world.
Through these experiences, we discussed how children can be even safer at kindergarten by reviewing how to communicate with them while walking on stairs, where teachers should stand, and where to display things.