This work is my own work and does not represent the views of Macquarie University staff or students.
Background.
This critical evaluation excerpt required an in depth analysis on three key sources given in relation to the new increasing emphasis on healthy eating in early childhood. Through this, it was recommended to evaluate the quality of evidence used for the authors arguments.
Similarly, Gerritsen et al. (2017) set out to determine if child care centres in New Zealand meet nutrition guidelines in regard to quantity, quality and variety of the food, for example the removal of ‘sometimes’ food within centres. With this information, Gerritsen et al. (2017) associated and analysed with consideration to menu cost and service characteristics. These results were conjured from 257 services through a weekly submission of menus, which were then scored in compliance with regulations and guidelines. There is a prominent emphasis in the results of the cost of food, the prevalence of childcare menus and how or if these menus comply with government guidelines. Almost all services who provided food daily bought food from a supermarket, and more than half served food grown on site. With this in mind, the authors establish the menu cost per-child-per-day had an average cost of NZ$3.68 for those who provided lunch and at least two other snacks. In Figure 2, Gerritsen et al. (2017) demonstrates the link between cost of food and the menu score, with two centres having a 100% score and an average cost of under NZ$3. In regard to the prevalence of child care menus, 73.4% of services that provided food daily had a written menu, whereas no play centres had. These menus when analysed against New Zealand Guidelines were found to have a proportion of 57.9% with a score of 8 or more. In summary, only 3 centres provided the right quantity, quality and variety as advised by government guidelines, therefore despite a prevalence of menus in childcare, none were able to reach and support children in healthy eating. This source holds many problems in regard to how evidence was retrieved. The use of an online submission of weekly menus holds much speculation as to how much of it can be falsified and whether or not the menus have been put into practice effectively and consistently. As mentioned before, many centres menus are derived from other centres that are posted online, therefore without the proper knowledge, educators can be led to believe that menus found online are up to par with current regulations and guidelines. This also could have resulted in an outcome of many centres having the same menus, which was not specified in the article so is very unlikely. Despite this, the authors show effective evidence to contrast with their own, through the use of comparing results with previous reports, such as a 2012 report from New South Wales on childcare centres meeting the serving recommendations. Another strength of the research was the inclusion of a limitations portion, in which it self- criticises different areas that could show some form of bias or error in the analysis.
Katelyn Donnelly 