Introduction: The age of preschool children is the golden age where the physical and psychological is rapidly developing then it is necessary to fulfil the nutritional needs. This is a period that is vulnerable to under-nutrition and over-nutrition. To deal with these problems, nutritional monitoring status must be carried out jointly between teachers, parents, and health care workers. Most early childhood education teachers have not assessed children's nutritional status and only weighed them. Based on these problems, the early childhood education Anthropometry Pocket Book was made to assist teachers in determining the nutritional status of children.
Method: The study used a different subject design and was carried out in April-October 2021 involving 52 samples, divided into two groups, namely the Control Group with 26 people and the Treatment Group with 26 people. The data collected such as sample identity and data on the ability of teachers to assess nutritional status using the BW/Age, Height/Age, BW/H, and BMI/A indexes before and after the intervention in the Control and Treatment Group. The data were analyzed descriptively by looking for the mean, standard deviation, and different tests were carried out to determine the difference in the effect of treatment on the control group and the treatment group, statistical tests Independent samples t-test at significance level (0.05) used on homogeneous data and Mann Whitney test on inhomogeneous data.
Result: The results showed that the average ability of teachers to assess children’s nutritional status in the Treatment Group was higher than the Control Group after being given the intervention. The enhancement before and after intervention in the control group with body weight/age (BW/A) index was 69.1%, height/ age (H/A) was 67.0%, BW/A was 71.5%, and body mass index/age (BMI/A) was 95.4%. While the increase in the Treatment Group with index BW/A 235.9%, H/A 220.5%, body weight/height (BW/H) 225.8%, and BMI/A 141.5%.
Conclusion: Statistical analysis Independent samples t-test at the significance level ?=0.05 showed that there was a significant difference (p<0.05) in the teacher's ability to assess the nutritional status of children with the index BW/A, H/A, BW/H, and BMI/A in the control group with treatment after intervention. The teachers of early childhood education are always expected to make it a habit to monitor children's nutritional status using a pocketbook on child nutrition anthropometry that has been applied.
