TY - JOUR
T1 - Exploring the ‘everyday philosophies’ of generalist primary school teacher delivery of health literacy education
AU - Cruickshank, Vaughan
AU - Pill, Shane
AU - Williams, John
AU - Nash, Rosie
AU - Mainsbridge, Casey Peter
AU - MacDonald, Abbey
AU - Elmer, Shandell
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - The enactment of the Australian Curriculum for Health and Physical Education (AC:HPE) is intended to be informed by five ‘propositions’ or Key Ideas, one of which is ‘Develop Health Literacy’. Our study occurred at four Tasmanian primary schools and was conducted by a research team consisting of public health and education academics. This team composition reflects the nature of the HealthLit4Kids program as a university and community grant-funded study intervention. We examined inter-dependent networks, of teachers and children, to investigate Health Literacy (HL) teaching. Data were collected from 30 primary teacher participants and figurational sociology was our theoretical framework. While our program increased teacher awareness about health education, participants demonstrated limited HL knowledge with their teaching largely informed by ‘everyday philosophies’. While increasing health awareness is a welcome first step with the potential to broadly influence students’ adult behaviours, the teachers’ ideas about HL were largely fantastical. This finding was supported by a latent data theme showing a restricted connection between teacher HL knowledge and the AC:HPE.
AB - The enactment of the Australian Curriculum for Health and Physical Education (AC:HPE) is intended to be informed by five ‘propositions’ or Key Ideas, one of which is ‘Develop Health Literacy’. Our study occurred at four Tasmanian primary schools and was conducted by a research team consisting of public health and education academics. This team composition reflects the nature of the HealthLit4Kids program as a university and community grant-funded study intervention. We examined inter-dependent networks, of teachers and children, to investigate Health Literacy (HL) teaching. Data were collected from 30 primary teacher participants and figurational sociology was our theoretical framework. While our program increased teacher awareness about health education, participants demonstrated limited HL knowledge with their teaching largely informed by ‘everyday philosophies’. While increasing health awareness is a welcome first step with the potential to broadly influence students’ adult behaviours, the teachers’ ideas about HL were largely fantastical. This finding was supported by a latent data theme showing a restricted connection between teacher HL knowledge and the AC:HPE.
KW - Health education
KW - health literacy
KW - figurational sociology
KW - teachers
KW - primary school
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85129157613&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/25742981.2022.2059384
DO - 10.1080/25742981.2022.2059384
M3 - Article
SN - 2574-299X
VL - 14
SP - 207
EP - 222
JO - Curriculum Studies in Health and Physical Education
JF - Curriculum Studies in Health and Physical Education
IS - 2
ER -