A Virtual Reality Nutrition Awareness Learning System for Children

Abstract

Taking daily breakfast with healthy food is highly important for children to provide their body with indispensable nutritional elements after a lengthy rest. Skipping the morning breakfast, makes the majority of them feel tired and unfocused in the classroom. In addition, eating junk food may result in regression in children performance and generate important diseases like overweight or teeth decay. Several initiatives have been proposed to incite children to take their daily breakfast before going to school. However, we still need more efficient and attractive approaches to motivate the children eat healthily. In this research, we propose a virtual reality immersive system that allows the children to prepare their breakfast through direct interaction with food items. They can move into the virtual environment and select the food they like and receive immediate feedback about them. This approach enhanced the learning skills of children and kept them engaged for a longer time. An animated multimedia based tutorial is presented first to the children within a family setting to teach them about the importance of daily breakfast and the available items. They are then asked to use the virtual reality system to select healthy elements for their breakfast using a handy controller. They can see the items in an immersive environment and hold them virtually and place them on their plates. We compare the proposed VR approach with the traditional approaches of teaching. A group of 29 school children of 7-9 years old have been assessed using the different approaches. Our findings show clearly that the VR approach is a promising approach to learn. The children enjoyed learning through the VR and become more engaged as they interacted directly with the food items in a fully immersive environment.