Effective First-AId Education for Secondary School Children: Current Methods and Latest Insights

This article aims to analyse, through a questionnaire, whether the selected activating methods and the CLIL methods are effective in teaching first aid for secondary school children. Secondary school children (lower secondary level, N=231) from South Bohemia (municipalities with different populations) filled out questionnaires before and after a first-aid course between 2019 and 2023. Evidence-based educational pathway and current European Resuscitation Council guidelines were followed. The study was focused on the differences in the level of knowledge and attitudes of children educated partially/fully through activating methods/CLIL compared to common first-aid teaching (PowerPoint presentation, first-aid videos, worksheets). Through the questionnaire survey (a) significant differences were found in the mean values of knowledge of first aid in sum before and after a first-aid course in all subgroups with partial/fully teaching through activating methods/CLIL (p=0.00) as in all subgroups with conventional teaching (p=0.00), (b) the assigned role (rescuer vs. rescued) in simulations with moulage does not affect the increase in knowledge level (p=0.53) and children prefer the role of the rescued (p=0.04), and (c) children educated through activating methods/CLIL declare a higher attractiveness of teaching (100%), a greater motivation to continue learning first aid using the same methods (88%) and a greater willingness to pass another first-aid course (100%). In general, from the short-term perspective both approaches of teaching first aid are effective (p=0.00), but from the long-term perspective teaching partially/fully using activating methods/CLIL is more appreciated by children. After the first-aid course 96% of children evaluated that first aid is a very important or important part of the curriculum.