Abstract

In Taiwan, people are getting more aware of beauty treatments and the concept of health care. This study hopes to bring all relevant concepts such as Aromatherapy, essential scented oils, medical foods, human meridians, Chinese five elements therapy, and beauty business management into the curriculum design, and seriously considered many factors when designing the curriculum. After that, a teaching experiment was conducted to evaluate if the courses were well planned. The experiment method incorporated a one-group pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design. The sample group consisted of a training class for beauty and body shaping in Pingtung County. After the class was over, a curriculum satisfaction survey was also conducted. All data were analyzed by SPSS with descriptive statistics and t-test for dependent samples. The results are as follows: 1) After the experiment, the curriculum proved to be effective in teaching. 2) Students majoring in Nursing or Cosmetology did not show any statistical difference in learning achievement. 3) After the class was over, students' grades improved and they displayed more knowledge about Aromatherapy. 4) Most students gave positive feedback regarding the learning activities of the Aromatherapy class. 5) Participants thought that this course was helpful in promoting self-interest in Aromatherapy class in the future. Finally, the researcher provided some suggestions for further study and future reference according to the research results. Key words: Aromatherapy, curriculum planning, learning achievement. INTRODUCTION In recent years, humans entering the era of science and technology have lived with stressed and quickly moving lives In ancient times, the Chinese believed that nature is composed of five elements, wood, fire, earth, metal, and water and by regulating these five elements all organisms in the cosmos are able to change their fate and luck as well as relax physically and psychologically In recent years, due to the advanced development of technology, Aromatherapy has been used in new devices such as diffusion lamps, ultrasonic spray machines, and essential oils burner to replace traditional method. Different containers are used for diffusion to get the "fragrance" for physical and psychological purification. Course title Basic theory of Five-Element Aromatherapy Hours Course objective This course aims to help students understand the theory and techniques of Five-Element Aromatherapy and its application to cosmetics and health care. With the effective integration of Five-Element Aromatherapy into cosmetics application, students will learn about its definition and development and will be able to know how essential oils help the human body as well as safe dosages and usage. This will help students of beauty science to enter relevant job markets. Credits (36 h) Basic Research purposes are as follows: 1. Discussion on the current implementation of the professional curriculum of Aromatherapy; 2. Curriculum planning of Aromatherapy; 3. Discussion on the learning effect of the Aromatherapy curriculum among students majoring in Nursing and Beauty Science; 4. Analysis of satisfaction of the Aromatherapy curriculum among students majoring in Nursing and Beauty Science; 5. Understanding the learning interest of Aromatherapy curriculum between students majoring in Nursing and Beauty Science and their future needs. MATERIAL AND METHODS This study uses investigation techniques in order to attempt to understand the demand for cosmetics and the Aromatherapy health care market as well as cultivate Nursing and Beauty Science students with cosmetics, health care, and medical knowledge. Eastern and Western Aromatherapy applications have been added to the cosmetics and health care curriculum for fourth and fifth year junior college students majoring in Nursing and Beauty Science. It is our hope that with suitable applications for the cosmetics and medical market, students in Taiwan are able to develop other job skills. Course design Curriculum planning of this study is divided into academic subject and technique learning in two credits (36 h) shown as in Research tool Description of the draft expert questionnaire This questionnaire, according to the literature review, adopts the Likert's five-point scale (most important, very important, important, unimportant, and most unimportant). There are four curriculum planning dimensions in the questionnaire: objectivity, applicability, feasibility, and diversity for the experts to evaluate the importance of each subject. The total average points of each dimension were evaluated with high scores indicating a strong identification to the dimension. A pre-test was also conducted after the questionnaire design. Validity and reliability were evaluated after collecting the questionnaire with Cronbach's α of 0.828, showing high reliability. Subjects Subjects are the key to the success of this study. Two types of experts were surveyed with questionnaires: (1) educators in the technological and vocational system -department directors from colleges and universities; (2) directors or practitioners engaged in either the cosmetics, recreation, or health care industry. In total, the questionnaires were sent to 30 experts and collected with a return rate of 100%. SPSS was used for the analysis after the questionnaire was collected. Evaluation of the learning effect Evaluation of development formation: This study uses "cognitive testing of Aromatherapy" as the evaluation tool after consulting relevant Aromatherapy references from both Eastern and Western traditions as well as literature review. Certification course contents, competence indicators, and concrete objectives of the International Federation of Aromatherapists (IFA) as well as the teaching experience of the author were also incorporated. The author uses basic knowledge of each subject introduced to students according to the teaching objectives to test the understanding of students on Aromatherapy. Multiple choice questions were used. Draft test questions were reviewed by ten experts from the industry. They proposed suggestions regarding question content and description. The researcher thus modified the pre-test questions accordingly. Non student subjects, a total of 30, were tested to determine difficulty and item discrimination. For the pre-test difficulty and item discrimination analysis, the evaluation scores of students were ranked in group order with the highest 25% and the lowest 25%. The "difficulty" of each item refers to the average of the correct responses given by the highest and lowest groups while "item discrimination" is the discrepancy derived by deducting the correct responses given by the lowest group Pre-testing: The pre-test was conducted on July 8, 2008, one day before the implementation of the teaching experiment to compare whether there was a difference between the two classes before the teaching experiment. Subjects were tested at the same site and time. The researcher supervised the pre-test in person to avoid test issues caused by irrelevant interruptions. same teacher from July 9 to August 29, 2008, a two-month time frame. The total teaching period is 36 h. The learning responses of students were observed and recorded during classes in order to understand the learning effect of students. Post-testing: After the teaching experiment was completed in August 2008, subjects were post-tested at the same site and same time. There are two parts of a post-test: conclusive evaluation and learning satisfaction questionnaire. The pre-test, validity, and reliability testing were conducted according to the questionnaire design method. Then subjects were asked to fill in a questionnaire and their opinions toward curriculum planning and teaching contents were collected to form the basis for data analysis. The researcher in the end keyed in and saved the source data and compared the learning effect of the students. Interviews were also conducted separately according to the data and the final results were compiled for the curriculum modification. Research procedure: The planning procedure of this study is divided into four stages -(1) preparation stage: define the topic and literature collection; (2) curriculum design stage: includes expert evaluation and curriculum pilot teaching; (3) data analysis and modification stage: evaluate and modify research according to data collected; and (4) final report writing: publish results. RESULTS Expert questionnaire analysis The expert questionnaire analysis