What is a Health Promoting School? Part 1 of 2

What is a health promoting school? – Part 1

Dr Hugh Shannon, a Senior Lecturer in HPE at Queensland University of Technology speaks with authors Sue Dimitrijevich (Health education consultant & former school principal) and Amanda Ferguson (Project development officer – Nutritionist, Foodcore Nutrition Services) about tips and insights from the latest edition of the book ‘What is a health promoting school? Increasing health literacy in WA schools’.

Part 1 includes discussion of what constitutes a health promoting school (HPS), the importance of making schools healthier places to live, learn and work, the HPS framework, health literacy skills, modelling positive health behaviours, and a call-to-action encouraging stakeholder engagement and co-design.

For further information and access to a free PDF copy of the book visit:

https://wahpsa.org.au/healthpromotingschools/what-is-a-health-promoting-school/

Transcript

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00:00:06 Hugh 

Hello and welcome to another episode of the ACHPA Health Promoting Schools podcast series. 

00:00:11 Hugh 

Thank you for listening to this episode focused on how health promoting schools can be fostered and the newly released third edition of the resource, What is a Health Promoting School? 

00:00:21 Hugh 

Increasing Health Literacy in WA Schools, published by the Western Australia Health Promoting Schools Association. 

00:00:28 Hugh 

My name is Hugh Shannon and I'm a Senior Lecturer in Health and Physical Education at Queensland University of Technology and a member of the Australian, the ACHPA Health Promoting Schools Committee. 

00:00:39 Hugh 

It's my pleasure to introduce the authors of this fantastic resource for school settings, Sue Dimitrovic and Amanda Ferguson. 

00:00:49 Hugh 

Welcome Sue and Amanda, and thank you for joining me in this conversation today. 

00:00:55 Hugh 

Sue, you were the project lead for this book. 

00:00:58 Hugh 

Can you give the listeners some insights into your background and involvement with this resource? 

00:01:04 Sue 

Yes, you. 

00:01:06 Sue 

I have had more than 40 years experience as a primary educator, a principal, curriculum and resource writer, presenter and facilitator at all levels of education. 

00:01:17 Sue 

And for the last 

00:01:18 Sue 

20 odd years, I've been a private health education consultant. 

00:01:22 Sue 

And it was in this capacity that I wrote and researched and wrote this book for WA Health Promoting Schools Association, which we fondly call WOPSA. 

00:01:35 Sue 

Interestingly, when starting to develop this third edition, 

00:01:38 Sue 

I discovered that I was one of the three teachers who wrote a case study for the very first edition in 1995 when I was a teacher. 

00:01:49 Sue 

So then in 2011, a team of three of us wrote the 2nd edition and now I've written the 3rd edition. 

00:01:58 Sue 

I'm passionate about school health promotion and education, and I continue to work, often in a voluntary capacity, advocating for education based on the Health Promoting Schools framework. 

00:02:11 Sue 

I'm an honorary life member of WOPSA, having been a member for a very long time, since 1997. 

00:02:19 Sue 

And I enjoy maintaining my networks with schools, universities, and other relevant health agencies. 

00:02:27 Hugh 

Thanks, Sue. 

00:02:28 Hugh 

That's a great introduction. 

00:02:29 Hugh 

And Amanda, your role was project coordinator. 

00:02:32 Hugh 

Please tell us a bit about your professional work and contribution to this book. 

00:02:37 Amanda 

Sure, thanks, Sue. 

00:02:38 Amanda 

So I'm a public health nutritionist and have been with FoodCorps Nutrition Services in WA for nearly two decades. 

00:02:46 Amanda 

And in that time, I've predominantly worked in the school environment to support the health in that environment. 

00:02:55 Amanda 

specifically. 

00:02:57 Amanda 

I'm also the immediate past president and current treasurer of Focus, which is the Federation of Canteens in Schools. 

00:03:04 Amanda 

They're an advocacy group that focuses on the school food environment. 

00:03:09 Amanda 

And I've been involved with, it's funny that Sue says WAPSA because I say WAPSA and it's always a bone of contention in WA. 

00:03:16 Amanda 

But I've been involved with WAPSA for as long as I've been with Food Corp for nearly two decades. 

00:03:23 Amanda 

I have held a lot of roles within the executive committee as president and vice president. 

00:03:29 Amanda 

I'm currently on the committee. 

00:03:32 Amanda 

And together with the WAPSA committee, I was sort of the lead in writing the application to Health Way to get the third edition of the Health Marine Schools book underway. 

00:03:44 Hugh 

That's fantastic. 

00:03:45 Hugh 

That's really good background to get us going. 

00:03:48 Hugh 

So I'd just like to 

00:03:50 Hugh 

just take a moment to understand what was the original motivation for this, the 1st edition of this book? 

00:03:57 Hugh 

What was the, why did we end up with this great resource? 

00:04:01 Sue 

Well, Amanda and I were having a quick discussion this morning about that. 

00:04:04 Sue 

And really, we have no idea in 1995, because it was before our time, both of us. 

00:04:13 Sue 

However, I do know a few of the people who were instrumental in writing it. 

00:04:18 Sue 

And I think it was probably a very new concept in WA. 

00:04:25 Sue 

And it was also written by the School Health Coalition. 

00:04:30 Sue 

And that then changed its name sometime in the early 2000s from School Health Coalition, which started in 1989, to 

00:04:43 Sue 

Wapsa or Wapsa. 

00:04:46 Sue 

So one of the case studies, as I said, one of the three case studies was one that I had written, had been asked to write from my primary school. 

00:04:56 Sue 

So yes, we have no idea exactly why it happened, but we're very pleased that it did. 

00:05:03 Hugh 

That's great. 

00:05:03 Hugh 

And so we heard a little bit there about the evolution of this resource and we have a great resource that schools can use. 

00:05:12 Hugh 

to consider how they can become health promoting settings. 

00:05:17 Hugh 

Now, before we delve into the content of the book, we should explore the core focus, which is the health promoting school. 

00:05:26 Hugh 

That's the core focus of this book. 

00:05:28 Hugh 

So what is a health promoting school and why should schools be considered as health promoting settings? 

00:05:34 Hugh 

Why is that something that you both feel so passionate about? 

00:05:38 Amanda 

I think I might just, maybe if I just go back a little bit and explain about the 3rd edition, if that's okay, Hugh. 

00:05:46 Amanda 

So we kind of, both Sue and I had discussed sort of that, the 1st and the 2nd edition sort of being a fair distance apart. 

00:05:53 Amanda 

So 95 and then 2011. 

00:05:56 Amanda 

And then the 3rd edition obviously was published in 2025. 

00:06:00 Amanda 

And 

00:06:01 Amanda 

We feel that, I mean, it came about because obviously the World Health Organization had released the new guidelines and the frameworks. 

00:06:10 Amanda 

And so that was really important for us to be able to disseminate that information to educators. 

00:06:15 Amanda 

But there was also a really important person that was part of WAPSA, which was Jill Darby. 

00:06:20 Amanda 

And she currently still is an adjunct at Edith Cowan University in WA. 

00:06:25 Amanda 

And she spent a long time 

00:06:28 Amanda 

member and contributor to ARTSA. 

00:06:29 Amanda 

And it was her that was sort of saying, are we doing another edition because we use this in the universities and it needs to be up to speed. 

00:06:36 Amanda 

So if we're teaching about health promotion and health promoting schools, it needs to be relevant. 

00:06:42 Amanda 

So I guess that probably leads into that whole concept of what is a health promoting school and why that resource was so important. 

00:06:53 Amanda 

Anything else you wanted to add? 

00:06:55 Amanda 

No. 

00:06:56 Amanda 

And now I've forgotten the question that you asked, which was why is a school, why should it be? 

00:07:02 Amanda 

Why is it so important? 

00:07:03 Hugh 

Yes, yeah. 

00:07:04 Hugh 

What is the value of creating health promoting schools? 

00:07:07 Hugh 

Why is that something that's so important to you? 

00:07:11 Amanda 

I think we probably need to understand about the importance of schools as almost like a prevention or a preventative health setting. 

00:07:21 Amanda 

If we think about the fact that the majority of children are at school for 14 years, 

00:07:26 Amanda 

they're a captive audience. 

00:07:28 Amanda 

It's a setting where you can have the most impact on health literacy and children's health that then leads into better health outcomes later in life and also better education outcomes as well. 

00:07:40 Amanda 

So I think we need to spend more time focusing on schools as a setting for health promotion because it can have the most impact for them later in life. 

00:07:52 Amanda 

So 

00:07:54 Amanda 

developing something like the book that aligns with all the other frameworks and guidelines is just so important because it gives the teachers and others at the school something to use. 

00:08:03 Sue 

And one of the quotes that I've used over many decades that I think it reflects that Amanda's thoughts there is that we can't educate children who are not healthy and we can't keep them healthy if we're not educators. 

00:08:19 Sue 

So I think health and education is 

00:08:23 Sue 

just linked. 

00:08:25 Amanda 

Goes hand in hand. 

00:08:27 Sue 

Yeah. 

00:08:28 Hugh 

That's fantastic. 

00:08:29 Hugh 

It's great. 

00:08:29 Hugh 

Thank you. 

00:08:30 Hugh 

And just extending that thought there, collectively, what progress are we making in the health promoting school space? 

00:08:40 Hugh 

Have we made progress to encourage schools to be healthier places to live, learn and work? 

00:08:48 Sue 

I'd say yes, we've definitely made progress. 

00:08:51 Sue 

but probably not enough. 

00:08:54 Sue 

I think if we consider the WA context, we have, the government has, and health departments have significant policies and statements about health education and health promotion in schools. 

00:09:08 Sue 

Earlier this month, the WA government released a statement about creating healthier WA school environments through the Healthy Schools Program. 

00:09:17 Sue 

So this is a grant program run through Healthway for funding between $3,000 and $5,000 per project application. 

00:09:27 Sue 

And projects are required to adopt A principles of best practice through alignment with the world-renowned Health Promoting Schools framework that was from the media statement. 

00:09:39 Sue 

So I think we have some 

00:09:44 Sue 

impetus for promoting this framework. 

00:09:50 Sue 

And we are getting schools on board, as you can see by the 13 case studies we have in this book. 

00:09:57 Sue 

But yeah, I just don't know that schools see it as a priority. 

00:10:06 Sue 

The other thing that's happened in WA is that the Department of Education has created a category in their WA Education Awards in excellence in wellbeing and learning. 

00:10:18 Sue 

And that's been for the last two years. 

00:10:20 Sue 

And again, this is progress. 

00:10:22 Sue 

But in my view, I think because it's not a core subject and it's more difficult to assess, it's not as black and white as other subject areas, 

00:10:35 Sue 

And I think a lot of people don't want to teach, in my experience, I have found that people don't want to teach health education. 

00:10:43 Sue 

They don't feel confident or they don't see it, the value as health as a priority. 

00:10:52 Sue 

So it's, we need a whole lot more progress, I think. 

00:10:57 Sue 

We need to change the perception that 

00:11:01 Sue 

health education and health in schools is not a real subject. 

00:11:08 Hugh 

Thanks for those insights, Sue. 

00:11:11 Hugh 

Now, the students are an obvious focus for schools, as they're the core business of schools is to educate the next generation. 

00:11:19 Hugh 

However, the Health Promoting Schools concept, it extends beyond this important group. 

00:11:24 Hugh 

So it obviously includes students. 

00:11:25 Hugh 

But can you give some examples of other important stakeholders within and external to Health Promoting Schools? 

00:11:35 Amanda 

Sure. 

00:11:35 Amanda 

And it's funny because Sue and I were also talking about this because when we got into the final stages of the book, 

00:11:42 Amanda 

Sue said, I've made, and correct me if I'm wrong here, so she made a list of all of the external agencies that had been represented in the book and there was over 81 of them. 

00:11:53 Amanda 

So you can see just by that sheer number, and this is just talking about 13 case studies, so 10 in the book and then three that are on the website, the sheer number of external agencies and organisations that had been involved in those case studies is so important because you can't, 

00:12:11 Amanda 

I think it's really important to understand that you can't do this just in a silo. 

00:12:15 Amanda 

So for health and wellbeing to be really well embedded, bringing external organisations in is important. 

00:12:23 Amanda 

And even things like the Health Way grants that's so mentioned, give schools that extra capacity to be able to do things better. 

00:12:31 Amanda 

So maybe it's $3,000 to buy new equipment, or maybe it's to pay somebody to come in and give some kind of a 

00:12:41 Amanda 

an overview of their project and then to work with the school for a term. 

00:12:44 Amanda 

I mean, I'm not sure, but I think internally what's really important is the teaching staff. 

00:12:51 Amanda 

And we often talk about that champion. 

00:12:52 Amanda 

So that one person in the school that just, champions that health and wellbeing and is the person that continues to follow through to set up, that sets up the action plan and then follows through all those steps to make sure it happens. 

00:13:07 Amanda 

Having the support of the principal obviously is key as well. 

00:13:10 Amanda 

And sometimes the principal is the champion or sometimes you've got a supportive principal and a champion, which is, you know, the perfect match. 

00:13:19 Amanda 

Community health nurses in WA play a really big role in health promotion in schools and that's fantastic, as well as chaplains and then obviously all the other health promotion agencies that sit externally to that, just to help sort of drive that implementation. 

00:13:37 Amanda 

of any project or program. 

00:13:39 Hugh 

Yeah, thanks, Amanda. 

00:13:39 Hugh 

That's, yeah, some really important points there. 

00:13:41 Hugh 

And the champion, having a champion in the school was so critical to success. 

00:13:46 Hugh 

And I guess an extension of that there is that we need people to drive these initiatives and have the passion and the energy to make them work on a day-to-day basis and to generate discussion in the school setting is so important. 

00:14:01 Hugh 

But from a sustainability point of view, it's also important that we have a group collective 

00:14:07 Hugh 

approach in that so that when that champion, if they happen to leave that school or go to a different setting, that the ideas continue. 

00:14:15 Hugh 

That's the continuation is something that's so important. 

00:14:18 Hugh 

So just extending that point there, we have the Health Promoting Schools Framework, which was released in 1995 by the World Health Organisation, which includes the three key interrelated elements, curriculum, teaching and learning, school environment and partnerships. 

00:14:36 Hugh 

And more recently, the WHO followed up with the 2021 Global Standards for Health Promoting Schools. 

00:14:43 Hugh 

Why are these frameworks and standards, why are they so important when we're thinking about health promotion work in schools? 

00:14:51 Hugh 

Why is it important to consider these standards and the framework? 

00:14:55 Sue 

Well, number one, I think it gives credibility to the approach. 

00:15:01 Sue 

It's a global, evidence-based, credible 

00:15:05 Sue 

research that has informed this model. 

00:15:09 Sue 

So I think if teachers are passionate and want to do something in this area, they've got a lot of evidence to back them up. 

00:15:21 Sue 

I think that's, number one, that's important. 

00:15:24 Sue 

And it's long-term research too. 

00:15:27 Sue 

I think that also, sometimes people will see the word framework or global STEM 

00:15:35 Sue 

standards and they'll go, oh, well, that's not my business. 

00:15:38 Sue 

I don't need to know about that. 

00:15:41 Sue 

But if you take a step back and have a look at it, the new standards are really only the three circle model that many people who know about health promoting schools will be 

00:15:58 Sue 

familiar with, and is what you spoke about with the curriculum, teaching and learning, school environment and partnerships, it's that and expanded. 

00:16:10 Sue 

So it's a little more specific. 

00:16:12 Sue 

It gives a little bit more structure to those three elements. 

00:16:18 Sue 

The other difference, I think, is that it actually acknowledges the importance of government policy. 

00:16:27 Sue 

that influences, strongly influences what education departments and therefore schools and teachers will do. 

00:16:36 Sue 

And so in the book I talk about that part of the framework, teachers, we need to know that it exists, but teachers don't have any influence there particularly unless we're going to get some passionate 

00:16:54 Sue 

educators advocating for more health education, more value on health education, health promotion in schools. 

00:17:02 Sue 

So it's really those 3 circles translated with a little more structure. 

00:17:08 Hugh 

Thanks for that explanation. 

00:17:10 Hugh 

It was really good to hear. 

00:17:11 Hugh 

One of the sections in the book includes the title, Health Promoting Schools Framework, A New Model for Health and Wellbeing. 

00:17:19 Hugh 

What I liked about this section was the call to action and some important considerations. 

00:17:23 Hugh 

We've just heard some of those considerations. 

00:17:26 Hugh 

If I'm a teacher in a school with a good idea and I want to implement these ideas, what are some of the key messages you'd like to share around this particular model and how we move forwards and improve schools as health promoting settings? 

00:17:46 Sue 

Look, 

00:17:47 Sue 

As you spoke and Amanda did too a few moments ago, there are many key players. 

00:17:52 Sue 

You can't, as a teacher, it's not one teacher's responsibility. 

00:17:59 Sue 

We certainly talk about a committee of supportive people to work with these, developing these strategies and initiatives and implementing them. 

00:18:10 Sue 

So 

00:18:11 Sue 

it's really important to get the parents and the wider community on board as well. 

00:18:18 Sue 

They all have a role to play. 

00:18:20 Sue 

And I would very much encourage parents, and as a parent and a grandparent, I've been known to do this as well, but to actually ask the teacher or the principal, so what are you doing in health education? 

00:18:39 Sue 

What 

00:18:40 Sue 

what and provide some opportunities for some educational insights or just asking questions. 

00:18:49 Sue 

Because again, a lot of schools don't place a high value on health. 

00:18:56 Sue 

And I think if there are passionate, informed parents or even agencies and representatives that can actually go into schools and 

00:19:09 Sue 

you've got to set up, people don't know what they don't know. 

00:19:11 Sue 

So you've got to give that information as well. 

00:19:19 Hugh 

Now, so some of our listeners, as I was saying before, may have some great ideas. 

00:19:24 Hugh 

And another part of your book focused on the importance of co-design. 

00:19:30 Hugh 

Why is co-design with students and other stakeholders something that they should really be considering? 

00:19:37 Amanda 

Co-designs, it's an interesting space and it's one when we were writing the book, we had a discussion with the Department of Education and it was really important that when we looked beyond just the internals of the WA Health Promoting Schools Association, and there's a number of people that are on the committee that, you know, we have representatives on the WAPSA committee from Mental Health, from Kids Safe, from 

00:20:06 Amanda 

Sounds smart. 

00:20:07 Amanda 

Sounds smart. 

00:20:07 Amanda 

So it's the whole array of health organisations that work with schools. 

00:20:11 Amanda 

And it was important that we actually made sure that they were involved in every step of the process. 

00:20:16 Amanda 

And when we started to talk about the co-design of that with agencies, you then need to look at, well, what's the co-design process for students? 

00:20:25 Amanda 

And I know, and it sounds really odd to say, but 

00:20:28 Amanda 

We have to remember that children are the future, but they also understand what it is to have a lived experience. 

00:20:33 Amanda 

And unless we engage with them and we understand what that lived experience is and their ideas and their thoughts, then we can completely miss the mark. 

00:20:42 Amanda 

So I think it's vital that we focus on how being engaged in any project or program within a school can empower the students, that they want to be part of it, gives them a sense of ownership. 

00:20:58 Amanda 

And it also helps to develop better relationships between the students and the teaching staff if they are all working together in unison rather than just from this top-down approach, which I think sometimes we try to do that we know better, but that's not always the case. 

00:21:15 Amanda 

So 

00:21:17 Amanda 

if you look at co-designers, bringing in those external agencies to help the teacher understand that subject matter, and then the teacher to bring the students in so that she can understand what their perception is. 

00:21:30 Amanda 

I mean, it's the perfect scenario, isn't it? 

00:21:34 Amanda 

is, yeah. 

00:21:34 Amanda 

That's my thoughts. 

00:21:36 Sue 

I think for me as a teacher, I always found 

00:21:41 Sue 

health education to be intrinsically motivating, especially when it comes to talking about puberty and relationships and consent. 

00:21:50 Sue 

And so that's my background, particularly over 40 years. 

00:21:56 Sue 

So finding out what students want to know as well as 

00:22:05 Sue 

We can't just, because they don't know, again, they don't know the questions to ask because they haven't got the information. 

00:22:11 Sue 

But it's about being realistic and knowing that we can't co-design everything all the time. 

00:22:18 Sue 

And we also need to know that teachers have to work within boundaries and the syllabus. 

00:22:24 Sue 

So it's really important to get a balance, but to ask students also about what is it that they're interested in 

00:22:35 Sue 

Yeah, I think that's, there's a lot of value in that. 

00:22:38 Sue 

And I wonder, I know that that's the approach that the education department particularly is taking with some areas. 

00:22:48 Sue 

And I wonder if sometimes teachers are very set in their way of this is the curriculum and I have to get through this and, I understand that as well. 

00:23:00 Sue 

So trying to find that balance. 

00:23:01 Hugh 

That's important. 

00:23:04 Hugh 

That's great. 

00:23:05 Hugh 

Yeah, thank you both for the discussions there. 

00:23:09 Hugh 

Some really interesting things coming through there around engagement, engaging the students, helping them develop that intrinsic motivation is important as well. 

00:23:20 Hugh 

It was coming through there, which is good to hear. 

00:23:22 Hugh 

And yeah, so important for, we think of health promotion, the key outcome is we want people to make conscious decisions for themselves. 

00:23:31 Hugh 

So 

00:23:32 Hugh 

So engagement and intrinsic motivation is so important. 

00:23:36 Hugh 

Another focus of the book is health literacy, and it's a clear focus. 

00:23:41 Hugh 

It's in the title of the book. 

00:23:43 Hugh 

And there's a section on the importance of health literacy. 

00:23:48 Hugh 

I'm interested in all the elements of your book, but this one in particular was a strong focus because it's an aspect of my research and my teaching work. 

00:23:55 Hugh 

And for those that may not be familiar with the term, 

00:23:59 Hugh 

The World Health Organization defines health literacy as an individual's ability to gain access to, understand, and use health information and services in ways that promote and maintain health and well-being. 

00:24:13 Hugh 

And what I also liked was the inclusion of functional, interactive, and critical health literacy, three different forms of health literacy which have emerged from Professor Don Nupbeam's work in this space. 

00:24:26 Hugh 

And it's a focus of the 

00:24:28 Hugh 

the Australian Curriculum, Health and Physical Education. 

00:24:31 Hugh 

Health literacy is presented as one of the five propositions in the Australian Curriculum, Health and Physical Education. 

00:24:39 Hugh 

From A practical perspective, how can teachers help students develop health literacy skills? 

00:24:45 Hugh 

Because the key thing is it's about skills. 

00:24:47 Hugh 

It's having skills they can use in their day-to-day lives. 

00:24:50 Hugh 

So how can teachers help them develop those skills? 

00:24:53 Hugh 

And also how can teachers be positive role models within their own communities? 

00:25:00 Sue 

I think one of the biggest things that I found in actually teaching is that it's not, don't keep health education, health information to one hour a week on a worksheet. 

00:25:15 Sue 

And I know that there are still teachers who are doing that sort of thing 

00:25:23 Sue 

probably because, again, they're not confident or it's not their area of expertise, which most teachers it's not. 

00:25:32 Sue 

So I think cross-curricular approach is so important to developing these critical health literacy skills. 

00:25:41 Sue 

It can be covered in so many areas, just the getting the same 

00:25:49 Sue 

outcomes in your English or your reading or your language or your maths with the input of health information, health statistics, health, just everything. 

00:26:05 Sue 

So I know I feel like I'm probably preaching to the converted here. 

00:26:11 Sue 

Often for many people in your audience, they may think, well, of course, that's what you do. 

00:26:17 Sue 

But there's a lot of 

00:26:19 Sue 

people who are not passionate about this area. 

00:26:22 Sue 

And so I think giving them ideas and opportunities to go, well, I could change what I'm doing now to this bit of information, which will increase health literacy and health choices and skills with my students. 

00:26:38 Sue 

I think it's really important to keep parents informed and that information is going to help 

00:26:45 Sue 

potentially give parents the opportunity to improve their health understandings and health literacy as well, which then reinforces what we're dealing with and teaching students at school. 

00:27:01 Sue 

Modelling healthy behaviour, I think some areas are much easier to be more obvious in modelling positive health behaviours, such as SunSmart, 

00:27:15 Sue 

nutrition. 

00:27:18 Sue 

But because so many teachers don't know or understand this model or the importance of being a role model, I wonder if they sometimes they understand some of their behaviours, how that it can impact their attitudes and behaviours, choices of their students. 

00:27:38 Sue 

So there's a whole lot of ways, I think, that 

00:27:45 Sue 

we can improve students' health literacy. 

00:27:48 Sue 

And I do think that is a role of teachers. 

00:27:53 Sue 

But whether teachers actually understand that or agree with it or want to, yeah, we need to provide opportunities for discussion with teachers about extending their understanding of health education and health promotion in schools. 

00:28:12 Hugh 

Yeah, great, great points there. 

00:28:14 Hugh 

And 

00:28:15 Hugh 

Yeah, it's I guess one great thing that we have is because it is written as one of the key propositions in the Australian Curriculum in health and physical education, it is there. 

00:28:25 Hugh 

It's meant to be an intentional focus within schools and I agree that we've got opportunities to keep building that work and there's some good things happening in some schools out there and but certainly a way to go in terms of improving that and that comes with 

00:28:40 Hugh 

helping teachers understand what it represents and also how it can be included in their practices and their planning for their schools as well. 

00:28:49 Amanda 

Hugh, can I just, can I add, Sue and I, we often talk about how we have the same sort of analogies and one of the ones that we use a lot is that you can't be what you can't see. 

00:29:00 Amanda 

And I think in the school environment that is of the utmost importance. 

00:29:05 Amanda 

And because I come from a nutrition background, 

00:29:08 Amanda 

when I think about creating a whole school approach or a healthy school environment based on nutrition and food, it really does need to be about role modelling from teachers as well, because we, children today and students today are very well aware of the foods in WA in particular that can and can't be sold from the school canteen. 

00:29:28 Amanda 

But if you've got a situation where the teachers are sort of not modelling healthy 

00:29:34 Amanda 

selections of foods and drinks, then it's quite conflicting and students are at a really impressionable age and I think we often forget that, if they see teachers standing in the playground without a hat on, for example, or drinking some soft drink, that's probably not appropriate, then... 

00:29:51 Amanda 

there has to be some sense of accountability for teachers to understand what that role modelling really does. 

00:29:56 Amanda 

And it doesn't mean preaching to the children about healthy choices. 

00:30:00 Amanda 

And, you know, this is a good food and we don't use that language anymore. 

00:30:03 Amanda 

It's simply that visual aspect that I think sometimes is really important. 

00:30:07 Hugh 

Yeah, that's great. 

00:30:11 Hugh 

Absolutely, they pick up on lots of things, don't they? 

00:30:13 Hugh 

The children, adolescents in schools, and you know, that modelling is so critical. 

00:30:17 Hugh 

And I guess another aspect of that too is that 

00:30:22 Hugh 

we're all fallible, we all make good choices and we sometimes we make choices that aren't so great in terms of our health outcomes. 

00:30:29 Hugh 

And as teachers and schools can also be good role models in terms of change and progress and where they've turned things around. 

00:30:37 Hugh 

And that part of that is being vulnerable and opening themselves up and saying, hey, I've made some, you know, choices along the way that which weren't so healthy, but 

00:30:47 Hugh 

but I've made progress and so that can also be a great learning outcome for students too. 

00:30:51 Hugh 

But obviously it depends on whether the teacher was comfortable discussing that, but that can be good learning. 

00:30:57 Hugh 

Stay tuned for part 2.