<Anchor> As
the daily life of wearing a mask not only in school but also in day care centers has continued for more than a year, these days are being heard among teachers.
[When I take off the mask while eating, there are times when I am surprised to see the faces of the children.
At that time, the children looked like this by looking at the faces of the children. The mouth looked like this, and the nose looked like this...
.]
Children in the daycare period learn to speak and develop social skills while looking at other people's facial expressions and mouth shapes.
But these days, it's all covered with a mask, so we checked to see if it might affect the children.
Actually, this is Tim Park Hyun-seok.
<Reporter>
A child development center in Anyang, Gyeonggi-do.
My mother is worried about her 4 year old, 30 month old daughter this year.
[Mother: By this time, my older sister sings alone and speaks clearly, but the younger sister
speaks
slowly despite having an older sister.]
Around 24 months of age, the time when words were increased and began to speak in sentences was called'The Golden Age of Languages. ', but experts estimate that the reason could be that they wore masks and communicated and communicated during this period.
[Professor Jeongseon Son/Child Development Expert: Usually, children start with imitation when they first expand their language. Because I saw less facial expressions, mouth shapes, and gestures like this, the impact on children's development, especially language development... ]
Would other children be like this?
[Director Oh-kyung Kim/Nature and Daycare Center: The pronunciation is not clear, so it seems that the number of difficult children has increased.]
[Director Choi Eun-ah/Aram Daycare Center: Negative reactions, crying
because there is no
language for self-expression and no language for acceptance. , Crying, aggressive behavior, or shrinking.] The
results were similar in a survey of over 1,450 people, including daycare directors, teachers, and parents in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province.
When asked if the child development situation has changed since Corona 19, 71.6% of directors and teachers and 61.8% of parents answered yes.
In particular, 74.9% of directors and teachers and 52.7% of parents said that the use of masks reduced the chances of language exposure and language development.
What about the opinions of the academic and medical world?
When I asked 12 experts in child development, including professors and specialists, it affected not only language but also social development, so it had to be regarded as a quite serious problem, and then 5 people, which could lead to delays in the development of intelligence beyond language, was one.
There will be a negative impact, but there were also five opinions that if it ends in one or two years, there will be no big problem.
We also looked at the results of overseas research.
It has been confirmed that a mask that prevents you from reading facial expressions will negatively affect social interactions, namely, empathy, language development, and facial recognition.
However, there were opinions that it could be solved by taking off the mask at home and spending enough time with the family, but there were also opposition from domestic experts that this method has limitations in the case of dual-income couples.
Then what should I do.
One daycare center tried to show the shape of his mouth by wearing a transparent mask for the hearing impaired.
[Director Song Eun-joo/Kkotgil Daycare Center: I’m very scared. The teacher only showed her mouth transparently. I hate coming next to you, so, ah... I can't.] In the
end, it is best for daycare teachers to get the vaccine early and take off the mask using a self-test kit.
However, as the vaccination situation is difficult, until then, we have no choice but to help children's development centered on families in each family.
At home, one more effort is required to talk to the child.
[Professor Jeongseon Son/Child Development Expert: Showing facial expressions, making eye contact and doing skinship… How many conversations did their parents induce, play, and interact with?]
[Director Oh-kyung Kim/Nature and Childcare Center: The difficulty of children exposed to media a lot is because they only talk in one-sided language (not interactive reactions). In the end, it becomes a problem for relationship formation and sociality.] The
government must hurry to investigate the exact status of our children's development situation after Corona 19 and prepare measures.
(Video coverage: Kim Tae-hoon, video editor: Park Ki-deok, VJ: Kim Cho-ah, author: Kim Hyo-jin, Yang Bo-won, Kim Jeong-yeon, CG: Hong Seong-yong, Choi Jae-young, Lee Ye-jeong, Seong Jae-eun, Jeong Si-won)