비장애아동의 장애아동에 대한 수용태도 및 장애아동의 언어능력 향상을 위한 원예치료 프로그램의 적용

Application of Horticultural Therapy Program for Receptive Attitude towards Children with Disabilities of Children without Disabilities and Improving Language Capacity of Children with Disabilities

The objectives of this study were to investigate the effects of horticultural therapy program on receptive attitude towards children with disabilities of children without disabilities and linguistic development of children with disabilities. A total of sixteen children aged five to six including eight children with disabilities residing in M center for children with disabilities and eight from a children care center in City I, Northern Jeonla Province, South Korea participated in this study. The children were provided with 15 sessions of a weekly group horticultural therapy program lasting 40 minutes for each session from March to June 2012. The 15 session-program consisted of 10 sessions of outdoor gardening activities (preparing garden beds, sowing, planting, harvesting, etc.) and five sessions of indoor activities (planting, water cultivation, etc.). In order to investigate the receptive attitude of children towards with disabilities of children without disabilities, receptive attitude scale was used. In addition, to investigate the improvements in language capacity of children with disabilities, receptive language and expression language development scale were used. According to the result of this study, the perception of the receptive attitude towards children with disabilities did not significantly show improvement. However, after the horticultural therapy program, the children’s expressive language improved significantly. Therefore the horticultural therapy program focused on interaction through horticultural activities is deemed to be an effective strategy in improving language capability of children with disabilities. Additional studies are needed to verify the effects of horticultural therapy program for the receptive attitude of children towards children with disabilities of children without disabilities.