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Objective: The modern Australian diet is largely characterised by too few fruits and vegetables and too many discretionary foods. This is very different to how Indigenous Australians ate prior to colonisation. Native plants and seeds like bush tomatoes, warrigal greens, Kakadu plum and wattleseed are not common features of the contemporary Australian diet. We developed an initiative to incorporate native plants and seeds into a hospital inpatient menu to normalise their use and provide nutrition education to patients, staff and the community of the nutrition and sustainability benefits of native ingredients. Design: Between May and August 2022, the Chef's Special menu (for privately funded patients) featured Australian native ingredients in all dishes. The nutritional benefits of native foods were communicated to patients through a printed brochure delivered with the menu, to foodservices staff through in-service training, and to the broader community through social media. Setting: Urban hospital in Brisbane, Australia. Method: Data were collected on acceptability, engagement and reach of the education initiative. Results: The initiative was successfully delivered, with more than 8,000 patient brochures distributed, 45 staff attending training, and social media reaching approximately 10,000 people. The most frequently ordered main meal on the menu was grilled snapper (fish) with macadamia Asian herb salad and finger lime. Conclusion: The work highlighted how the patient menu in hospital can serve as a useful tool to communicate nutrition education to patients, staff and the broader community. In addition, we reflect on the many opportunities to continue to celebrate the nutritional benefits of Australian native foods in healthcare settings.

Background: Food-related advertisements have been identified as influential factors affecting Australian adolescents' food preferences and dietary habits. Objective: This study aimed to investigate adolescents' (athletes and non-athletes) views about healthy eating, the advertising of discretionary foods and beverages, and the effects of food advertising on dietary behaviours. Method: Qualitative study involving the analysis of data from seven focus group discussions with young people aged 12-17 years (N = 27; 10 males and 17 females; 14 elite athletes, 13 non-athletes) from three different socioeconomic status secondary schools. Results: Both athlete and non-athlete participants discussed the importance of how social media is used for food advertisements. Many adolescents exhibited scepticism about the intent of advertising discretionary foods and beverages targeted toward adolescents. Three themes were identified from the data analysis: (1) physical and cognitive benefits of healthy eating; (2) scepticism, mistrust and ethical concerns about food and beverage advertisements targeted toward adolescents; and (3) portrayal of thin and fit ideals in social media. Conclusion: Health educators and policymakers addressing adolescent healthy eating behaviours should focus more fully on the influence of social media food advertising. Greater promotion of the importance of good nutrition during adolescence may optimise training performance and improve young people's nutritional knowledge and healthy eating habits.

Background: Obesity-driven nutrition education in schools does not appear to result in healthier adolescent food choices. This study explored food systems as an alternative pedagogical approach to engage students in nutrition education. Methods: After playing a food systems computer game, 250 13- to 16-year-old students in 5 Western Australian secondary schools, participated in group discussions to distinguish learning and interests in food systems. Discussion records were thematically coded using constant comparative analysis. Results: Students reported crop growth, food production and food waste, healthier food choices, and food systems as knowledge outcomes of game play. They requested additional content on food production, costing, handling, processing, and accessing local produce. Experiential activities were preferred pedagogical approaches. Conclusions: Cross-curricular pedagogy which embraces human and planetary health through a food systems lens, can engage adolescents in nutrition education. Transformational computer games are effective to engage, educate and stimulate inquiry in food systems education.

Widespread tropical deforestation and biodiversity loss in Southeast Asia due to the oil palm industry can be addressed by encouraging consumers to purchase sustainable palm oil (SPO). An online experiment was conducted to assess whether addressing barriers relating to education, motivation and product availability would increase purchasing of SPO. Australian adults (n = 628) were randomly assigned to either: (1) a newly developed interactive educational website on palm oil and SPO; (2) an existing educational video on SPO; or (3) an interactive website on differentiating between real and fake news (an attentional control condition). All participants completed pre-intervention and immediate post-intervention measures. Most participants (n = 403) completed follow-up measures two weeks later. Multivariate analysis revealed that the interactive website and educational video increased both knowledge and the intention to purchase SPO (compared to the attentional control), but neither significantly impacted follow-up self-reported SPO purchasing behaviour. Low perceived product availability might help explain the intention-behaviour gap. Our results suggest that, in addition to increasing consumer knowledge and motivation, promoting sustainable consumption requires creating opportunities for people to engage in the desired behaviour.

Teacher delivered food and nutrition education (FNE) can be effective in improving children's food literacy and eating habits. However, teachers are known to face some barriers to the delivery of FNE globally. To obtain a deeper understanding of Australian primary school teachers' experiences and views, 17 teachers were interviewed. The results of the thematic analysis showed that teachers acknowledged the importance of FNE and were willing to include more FNE content into their teaching. We also identified the FNE topics taught, resources used, their teaching partners, and barriers encountered. The discussion presents strategies to overcome these barriers.

Objective: To gather research evidence on the association between diet and depression and anxiety among college students. Methods: Systematic searches were performed in CINAHL, PsycINFO, PubMed, and ScienceDirect databases to identify potentially relevant articles published between January 2000 and September 2020. Data were extracted from 21 selected studies. Results: Most of the cross-sectional studies found a positive association between diet and depression and anxiety; however, a few studies found inconsistent results. Moreover, several interventional studies demonstrated that a healthy diet (including consumption of fruit and vegetables) improved depression in the intervention group. Conclusions: The methodological limitations of cross-sectional studies to explain causality and the limited number of prospective interventional studies point to a pressing need to conduct more prospective, longitudinal, and randomized controlled trials to generalize the causal associations between diet and depression and anxiety. Further research is needed to investigate the biological mechanisms of nutrients' actions on anxiety and depression.

Research into pedagogical approaches used in early years' nature education, more specifically European and UK forest schools, remains according to Leather, 'undertheorised.' In a similar situation in Australia, the bush kindergarten programmes (referred to as 'bush kinders'), have had limited research attention. Influenced by European and UK forest school approaches, bush kinders are a recent development in Australian early years nature education. We discuss an ethnographic study where teaching and learning in three bush kinder settings was observed, each with different pedagogical approaches. The paper reports one main finding, where a wide range of pedagogical approaches were observed across the different bush kinder sites. To theoretically frame these pedagogical approaches, our analysis builds on Edwards' notion of play-based learning, along with a model of inquiry-based teaching proposed by Furtak et al. Using ethnographic methods we draw on fieldwork data and research literature to analyse bush kinder pedagogies. The paper contributes to the conceptualisation of pedagogy in early childhood nature and bush kinder programmes.

There is a growing issue of university students not being able to afford or have access to nutritious food. Although research reveals that food insecurity negatively impacts student well-being and engagement, few studies have explored its impact on academic performance. Most of these studies use self-reported measures of academic performance in college samples from the United States. The current study is novel in that it explores food insecurity in an Australian university sample and uses actual academic performance (weighted average marks; WAM) rather than relying on self-reported grades. We also consider the role of psychological distress in the relationship between food insecurity and academic performance. Participants comprised 664 undergraduate students aged 18 to 25 years at a public university in Melbourne, Australia. One-quarter of students (25.5%) were classified as food insecure. Renting, receiving government benefits, having a disability and being older were positively associated with food insecurity and food insecurity was associated with poorer academic performance and increased psychological distress. Psychological distress partially mediated the relationship between WAM and food insecurity, meaning that students experiencing food insecurity are more likely to experience increased psychological distress which then impairs their academic performance. The prevalence of food insecurity in university students suggest that interventions aimed at improving both mental health and access to food could serve to enhance success at university, especially for students who cannot afford or do not have access to nutritious food.

The international student experience has strategically transformed the internationalisation of higher education globally. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, international student wellbeing has decreased. To enhance their wellbeing, we argue international students' experience should be broadened to include community engagement, thereby increasing core capabilities for, by and with international students. Using Sen's capability approach as a conceptual framework, we conducted a study in South Australia during the height of the pandemic. Partnering with one local non-for-profit organisation, we asked: 'How have engagements with the local community affected international students' capabilities to enhance their wellbeing?' We offer critical interpretivist perspectives to report on a pilot study of 75 survey responses and 18 in-depth interviews. The findings identify diverse macro-structural forces that form a social context which has marginalised the students. Despite contingent and tenuous social relations and contexts, with support from the community outside the university, some students converted their capabilities to fortify their wellbeing. This study is critical given that the goal of re-strategising internationalisation of higher education begins from the students' needs through an effective partnership between universities and communities.

Meaningful and enjoyable experiences are important in the education of children. In this qualitative case study, the garden program (incl. market garden shop, garden care, Kid's Kitchen, and chicken coop) in one Australian primary school was explored to determine its impact on the mathematical learning of children. Data were collected using focus groups (four student, three parent and three volunteer groups), three teacher interviews, weekly garden journal entries and, when possible, through observation. This program provided opportunities for enriched mathematical learning facilitated by: early exposure to mathematical applications through mixed-age groups at different stations; an authentic, real-life setting to apply mathematical learning; and the consolidation of mathematical experiences through weekly engagement. These program features were found to positively impact the mathematical readiness, attitudes and competence of students.

Established healthy eating behaviours in childhood underpin the development of similar patterns into adulthood. School-based nutrition and cooking programs have been found to enhance nutrition and cooking knowledge and cooking self-efficacy. This scoping review examined the literature about the effectiveness of nutrition education programs conducted within the school setting. Databases were searched to identify relevant studies focused on primary school nutrition education and cooking programs. The evidence was assessed specifically in relation to how an effective program is reflected in the Health Promoting Schools Framework. Six articles met the inclusion criteria. Three programs cross-integrated with other school subjects. All programs used hands-on activities, and half incorporated gardening and included excursions to farms or markets. All programs highlighted the need for community and parental engagement. A cross-curricular approach can have a profound effect on improving dietary intakes, food and nutrition knowledge, and behaviours. Collaboration between teachers and nutrition educators is instrumental in delivering a successful program. Addressing the components of the Health Promoting Schools Framework in the development of a nutrition education and cooking program is integral to promote its successful implementation.

The LiveLighter® 2016 'Junk Food' campaign ran for 5 weeks in Western Australia (WA) and urged adults to reduce their junk food consumption to avoid weight gain and associated chronic disease. A cohort design assessed campaign impact on knowledge, beliefs and behaviour. Pre-campaign (n = 1501) and post-campaign (n = 737) telephone surveys of WA adults aged 25-49 were undertaken. A post-campaign-only sample (n = 501) controlled for pre-test effects. The campaign reached 57% of respondents and increased knowledge of the link between overweight and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (78% cf. 87%; P < 0.01). Following campaign activity, respondents were more likely to avoid purchasing food from settings depicted in the advertisements (fast food outlets: 63% cf. 77%; service stations: 82% cf. 93%; vending machines: 87% cf. 96%; all P < 0.001), particularly among pre-campaign consumers of fast food and salty snacks ([less than or equal to]2 times/week). Weight-loss self-efficacy increased among adults with higher body weight and campaign exposure (89% cf. 97%; P < 0.01), and there was no increased endorsement of overweight stereotypes among the full sample. Support for fiscal disincentives and nutritional disclosure policies increased among healthy weight adults. LiveLighter® positively influenced knowledge, beliefs and behaviours, along with attitudes towards policies to encourage healthy eating, supporting LiveLighter® as an advocacy campaign.

Food gardens are an underdeveloped resource for teaching and research in Australian universities. While some campuses have food or botanical gardens, outside the biological or physical sciences food growing is not routinely incorporated into mainstream curricula. This article investigates why and how we might change this. It examines universities' traditional reliance on classroom-based, non-experiential learning, which preferences reading and writing over doing, particularly doing anything outdoors. Questions are raised about the implications of this approach for environmental education and graduate environmental literacy. The article then explores the example that United States campus food gardens provide other universities, as well as the process of creating food gardens for teaching and research at a high-density campus in Sydney, Australia. The article ends by postulating lessons students and staff might learn about food systems, sustainability and green cities, when food growing is incorporated into teaching and research. The article aims to inspire academic staff, particularly outside the biological sciences, to instigate campus food gardens to increase graduate environmental literacy.

The development of healthy eating habits in adolescents is challenging. Resultantly, health educators are turning to digital devices to engage young people in nutrition education. This paper focuses on the development and evaluation of a computer game (Test Game B) to support healthier food choices. Test Game B was developed at an Australian university and trialled with 72 tertiary student volunteers along with a control game (Control Game A). Both games provided information related to the progression of food along the digestive tract with knowledge of digestion, nutrition, a healthy diet and attitudes to food choice measured before and after game use. Change in these indicator variables assessed game effectiveness. The study found that the transformational aspects of problem-based learning within a digital context can support healthier food choices in young people, whilst pre-service health education teachers may require learning in food digestion to support nutrition education in schools.

Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education has been identified as a keystone teaching and learning area for developing students' knowledge and skills on interdisciplinary critical thinking and problem solving (We use the term 'interdisciplinary' because discipline knowledge and methods were integrated from different disciplines in the project that used a synthesis of approaches). The position held by various government, industry and education stakeholders is that STEM learning, through different stages of education, will enable students to achieve their full potential. Underpinning this research was a response to an expressed school community need articulated through a primary school Principal's desire to integrate STEM learning into the classroom. Consequently, three primary schools from the mid north coast and north coast regions, New South Wales (NSW), Australia were involved in this research. In particular, the project facilitated teacher professional learning through authentic teaching and learning experiences coupled with transferable teaching and assessment strategies for the classroom. The rural and remote settings of the schools was influential in the design of the program. The methodology drew on Technacy Genre Theory to frame the interdisciplinary learning domains: Science (hypothesis testing literacies); Technology (digital microscope and robotics literacies); Engineering (food systems and biotechnology literacies) and Mathematics (data collection and statistics literacies). The findings indicated the teachers benefited through the development of effective strategies that led to successful outcomes on interdisciplinary teaching and learning and built up their confidence, knowledge and skills involved in the implementation of a STEM program into their primary school classrooms.

Enterprising students who understand the work environment are considered more employable. It is accepted that higher-education has a responsibility to produce career-ready-graduates. Practicum experience provides a critical role in this preparation. This study describes the development and implementation of the WIL instrument and WIL experience to assess the perceived skill development of students (n=19). This research utilized three data capture points: (1) employability skills cluster matrix-self-assessment tool (ESCM-SAT); (2) industry feedback from supervisors to develop a deeper understanding of the value of WIL; (3) students used the Gibbs reflective cycle (Gibbs 1988). There were improvements in all skills clusters, main gains were in career management (p<0.01). Supervisor feedback gave direction for improvement for; communication, preparation and organization skills. Student reflection suggests career management skills were strengthened, confidence increased, as did their value of academics. The ESCM-SAT, industry feedback and student reflection were deemed a suitable combination to measure the WIL experiences from a student perspective.

Research has shown effectiveness of redistribution procedures for decreasing packing and increasing swallowing. Redistribution has been done using lower manipulated-texture foods on an infant gum brush in specialized U.S. hospitals. We extended this by using regular texture bites of food in a short-term (1-2 weeks) home-based program in Australia, showing decreased then absent use of the procedure, and following up. Two children with autism spectrum disorder participated. We used a modified withdrawal/reversal design. Latency to swallow decreased. Participants increased variety to 90 and 122 regular texture foods across food groups. All goals were met including increasing independence in self-feeding. Both parents were trained. Gains maintained to 6 months and redistribution was no longer needed.

This article examines how transformative agency arises in families where parents are struggling with aspects of caring for young children. The mechanisms of how volitional action develops into transformative agency in everyday settings are not well understood. A fine-grained analysis of change is presented in the case of a parent who resolved difficulties relating to her daughter's feeding. This case is situated within a broader dataset relating to diverse Australian parenting support services. Through double stimulation, parents used multiple auxiliary tools to construct new motives, enabling them to expand understandings and develop new possibilities for action. Evidence of transformative agency was apparent in longer trajectories in which the conditions of parenting were transformed. Relationships between expansive learning, double stimulation, and transformative agency are conceptualized dialectically, offering fresh insights into the dynamics of transformative agency 'in the wild'.

The article outlines ways that teachers could use the content in Biomes and Food Security unit in the Australian curriculum, and its state and territory versions, to encourage their students to engage with higher order thinking. It first briefly discusses how to describe and classify higher-order thinking and argues that concepts are central to this thinking. It also argues that powerful knowledge, an idea associated with Michael Young, develops the same ways of thinking. The article then discusses the higher order actions of explaining (in the sense of explaining causation), analysing, synthesising (or generalising) and evaluating, and how they can be applied to the content of the unit. The contribution of geography's major concepts (such as place and interconnection) to higher order thinking, and therefore to making the unit "geographical," is also discussed. The article concludes with a description of a way of teaching the unit as an extended inquiry, organised as a series of questions. This strategy provides many opportunities to use higher order thinking, because to answer the questions students will have to explain, analyse, synthesise, generalise and evaluate, while the whole unit becomes an exercise in problem solving.

As the number of jobs in the science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM) workforce grows exponentially, there has never been a more important time to provide students with real-world learning opportunities that have 21st century implications. Measuring things that matter is a fundamental skill that formulates the backbone of many concepts across all STEM disciplines. Even though measurement underpins countless situations in everyday life, the concept is rarely taught in a manner that connects to the broader community. Unfortunately, when measurement is taught without context, students may struggle to make sense of the numbers and units involved (Farmer et al., 2015). The science innovation discussed in this paper, achieves authenticity by adding personal value to developing measurement as a skill. The overarching focus is to engage students through the study of how wasting perishable food links to plastic wastage. Contextualising the innovation and taking measurements of an everyday issue aligns students' personal experiences with perishable food freshness (Sengupta et al., 2019). Considering the broader community also ties the end users to measurements made, data collected, and research conducted. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate how students may develop measurement skills when teaching science through the consideration of a prevalent community issue.

Feeding problems, such as picky eating and food avoidance, are common in youth with autism. Other feeding and eating problems (e.g. disordered eating, fear of trying new foods, and insistence on specific food presentation) are also common in this population. This scoping review describes the nature and extent of feeding and eating problems in autistic youth and reports characteristics of autistic youth who experience such issues. Thirty-four studies were included in the current review, with almost all studies (91%) investigating feeding problems. Only 9% of studies examined concern with weight, shape, and/or body image, but several authors noted that disordered eating attitudes and behaviors may occur more frequently in those with autism than their peers without autism. No common individual characteristics (e.g. cognitive functioning and autism symptom severity) were identified for youth who experience feeding or eating problems. Although differentiating "feeding" from "eating" problems is critical for accurate identification and treatment of these issues, the existing literature has failed to do so. We propose that in future research "eating problems" be used when behaviors involve preoccupation with food, eating, or body image, and "feeding problems" be used when such preoccupation is absent.

In this article, the authors share ideas for harnessing the power of mathematics and children's literature to understand social justice issues with upper primary students, which can be adapted for younger students. The authors focus on the critical issues of food scarcity and waste. Children's literature and current data are purposefully employed to enlighten and challenge children's understanding of these social justice issues and call on them to take action.

Notions of creativity are increasingly central to educational scholarship and policies, but few studies attend to the intersection between "Health and Physical Education" (H/PE) and "creativity." In this paper we explore the literature on creativity in education and identify how creativity is represented across a broad spectrum of enquiry yet limited in relation to specifically H/PE. Writing from an Australian context, we examine how the key ideas and propositions from the "Australian Curriculum for Health and Physical Education" and the "Critical and Creative Thinking" capability raise important questions regarding the social emergence of educative creative purpose and potential in H/PE. We outline the utility of a 'creative ecologies' conceptual framework to consider contemporary practices in H/PE, and apply this to two purposively selected resources; to showcase their contextual eminence for creative learning in H/PE pedagogy and practice. The first resource, "Phenomenom!," was funded by Horticultural Innovation Australia to develop food literacy and is linked to cross-curriculum learning outcomes. The second resource, "Fitter. Faster. Better," is a St Martin's Youth drama-arts performance where students were prompted to design and perform a fitness programme for adults. Utilising the creative ecologies framework we illustrate the complexity of interconnected creative processes in H/PE as a series of networked elements and cultural flows (policies, practices, products, process, material environments, and partnerships). This framework is then used to identify how the two educational resources exemplify and open up a socially creative practice in both H/PE and everyday life. Our theoretical developments offer new ways to identify, design and enact quality creative and contemporary socio-cultural H/PE curriculum within a broader creative ecology.

There has been a recent surge in the popularity of school gardening programmes with different models claiming to address learning outcomes within the curriculum. For example, the 'kitchen garden' concept has had a rapid uptake across many Australian schools, promoted by both government curriculum support documents, and private organisations. Research points to the 'use' of school gardens as an initiative that predominantly draws on discourses of health, wellbeing and sustainability -- sometimes together but also often quite separately. Despite the rapid uptake of gardening initiatives in schools, and the explicit mention of 'gardening' in State based variations of the Australian National Curriculum, we know very little about how school gardens are being conceptualised by Health and Physical Education (HPE) teachers as part of their teaching -- either in primary or secondary contexts. This paper utilises data from a larger study which investigated how 24 generalist primary and secondary specialist HPE teachers talked about 'environmental health' within Health and Physical Education. The purpose of this paper is twofold: first it examines the range of discourses, that is, the different meanings and values, the teachers in the study associated with gardening as a practice expected of environmentally healthy citizens. Second, we draw on material and embodied knowledge to demonstrate how the very diverse ways the teachers talked about gardening, provide 'conditions of possibility' for thinking critically about gardening, and how school gardens might be positioned within the context of HPE.

Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) services are vital in the establishment of optimal infant and young child feeding (IYCF) practices and long-term health. This qualitative study, informed by Social Cognitive Theory, aimed to describe ECEC infant feeding environments. Nineteen formal long day care and family day care ECEC services and 124 educators in metropolitan and regional Queensland, Australia participated in interviews and professional conversations. Inductive and deductive analysis identified three key themes: 'agency', 'IYCF environment', and 'monitoring/surveillance'. This research has identified the key environmental, behavioural and cognitive factors that contribute to optimal IYCF practices in Australian ECEC. Tensions and negotiation between educators, parents, infants and the regulatory framework operate to develop collective agency. Key recommendations are: (1) increasing the visibility of infants in ECEC policy frameworks; and (2) building educator and parent self-efficacy in supporting infant agency in order to meet shared goals related to optimal infant health and well-being.

Chinese international students represent a significant social, economic and cultural force in Australian society. Research has demonstrated that Chinese students enrich Australia not only through their economic contribution, but through soft diplomacy and cultural links. Despite this, and the recent rapid growth in the number of Chinese international students to the country, only a small number of studies have focused specifically on understanding the health and employment experiences of Chinese students in Australia. This paper examines interview data from an ethnographic study involving ten Chinese international students pursuing higher education in New South Wales, Australia. Topics concerning work rights and exploitation, migration, and cultural differences are touched upon within their health and employment experiences. This paper provides insights for those working with Chinese international students in the areas of health education and promotion, diversity and inclusion, employment and mobility studies. The results contribute to broader insights into the inward/outward mobility of higher education students and Australia's "National Strategy for International Education 2025."

Purpose: Teachers play important roles in school food and nutrition education. This study aims to explore Australian teachers' self-efficacy beliefs (i.e. belief in their own capabilities to perform specific teaching tasks) in teaching secondary school food and nutrition-related subjects. Design/methodology/approach: Teachers' overall self-efficacy beliefs in teaching these subjects (overall-SEB) and self-efficacy beliefs in teaching different food and nutrition-related topics (topics-SEB) were explored using a survey among 183 teachers in 2017. Principal components analysis derived three overall-SEB components: "Motivation and accommodation of individual differences", "Classroom management" and "Communication and clarification" and three topics-SEB components: "Food system", "Food and nutrition information" and "Food preparation". Findings: Overall, higher percentages of teachers were confident or very confident in the majority of items that loaded on "Classroom management" and "Communication and clarification" compared to "Motivation and accommodation of individual differences". Moreover, higher percentages of teachers were confident or very confident about items that loaded on "Food and nutrition information" and "Food preparation" compared" to "Food system". The overall-SEB and topics-SEB were higher among more experienced teachers. There were moderate positive correlations between overall-SEB and topics-SEB components. Originality/value: The exploration of broader aspects of self-efficacy beliefs related to teaching secondary school food and nutrition-related subjects makes this study unique. The findings highlight that these teachers had high self-efficacy beliefs in teaching food and nutrition education, but there are gaps in tailoring the teaching process to meet the diverse needs of students and teaching broader food-related topics.

Australia's major state capitals are surrounded by highly productive food bowls, which are an important source of fresh foods for their growing populations. These food producing biomes are a rich resource for investigating key themes related to Biomes and food security, one of two Year 9 units of study in the Australian Curriculum: Geography. This paper draws on case studies of Melbourne and Sydney to explore challenges to food production in Australia's city food bowls. These challenges include population growth, urban sprawl, water scarcity and the impacts of climate change. We explore the implications of these challenges for the food security of Australia's urban populations, and we highlight the potential for emerging research findings about the significance of these food producing biomes to engage students with key themes of the Year 9 Biomes and food security unit.

Nudging is increasingly used in public health interventions in Western societies to produced health-promoting behavior changes; however, there is lack of clarity as to what constitutes a nudge, scant knowledge of the effectiveness of nudging techniques in public health lifestyle interventions and a number of ethical and value-based concerns. The aim of this review is to address these research lacunae and identify the characteristics of nudges in empirical research on public health interventions intended to induce healthy lifestyle changes, including whether they are effective. We conducted systematic searches for relevant articles published between January 2008 and April 2019 in three databases, PubMed, CINAHL and PsycINFO, and combined this with a metasynthesis to construct interpretative explanations. A total of 66 original studies met the inclusion criteria. The findings of the systematic review showed that most nudging interventions involved diet/nutrition, most were carried out as single experiments, and the majority had the intended effects. Specific nudging techniques were identified with respect to the broader nudging categories of accessibility, presentation, using messages and pictures, technology-supported information, financial incentives, affecting the senses, and cognitive loading; several studies included more than one nudging technique. Although many nudging techniques had the intended effects, it is unclear whether they would work outside the study setting. The synthesis revealed that the studies lacked critical reflection on the assumptions about health that were implicit in nudging interventions, the cultural acceptability of nudges, the context-free assumptions of nudging theory, and the implications of these aspects for the public health context.

Background: Research indicates home-packed school lunches are lower in nutritional value compared with school-provided meals. Due to the lack of a school lunch program, most of what Canadian children consume during the school day is determined by parents and caregivers through packed lunches. Despite this, little research has focused on the school lunch packing habits and attitudes of parents. The purpose of this scoping review was to improve understanding of parental perceptions, experiences, and habits with respect to home-packed school lunches. Methods: We conducted a scoping review of peer-reviewed and gray literature. We reviewed only studies published from January 2000 to January 2019 with a focus on parents' lunch packing habits for their school-aged children. Results: The review included 7 studies, with articles from the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada. The studies identified 6 themes influencing parental decisions regarding what to pack in their child's lunch--school environment, food as fuel, convenience, child's influence, cost, and the lunch experience. Conclusions: The decisions that influence what is packed in a school lunch are complex and indicate the need for support. Parents, schools, districts, and government policymakers need to work collaboratively to improve the healthiness of home-packed school lunches.

With the renewed emphasis on higher education as an agent for development and economic growth, Australia has joined other Western countries in contributing to increasing the intellectual workforce of Africa[1]. While Australia has provided scholarships to Africans for more than three decades, since 2005, the Australian Government has dramatically increased its commitment to invest in Africa's future by providing a series of development awards scholarships for Africans to advance their learning in priority areas including agriculture, food security, water and sanitation, public health, energy and resource management. These scholarships are the largest component of Australia's total aid to Africa. However, very little empirical research has been done to determine the impact of Australia Africa Long Term scholarship awards (AALT). This paper examines this new African intellectual workforce by presenting qualitative data from alumni engaging in this new flow of knowledge mobility. Experiences of public health graduates of Australia scholarship awards from Uganda and Mozambique will be discussed. Overall, we argue that that the Australia Africa scholarships program has a positive impact on alumni and is viewed favourably by Alumnis' employers and their alumni's families. However, there are many challenges and struggles which can impede alumnis' success in bringing forth the change they might envisage. Some of these factors include: finding a job at a suitable level, implementing their new knowledge, using their new skills and, generally, reintegrating into their home country (both socially and professionally).

This study surveyed 115 Australian parents' knowledge, views, and feelings of food allergy management and guidelines in primary schools. Although most parents were knowledgeable about food allergy management and related guidelines, half of them had limited understanding on how schools identify and respond to anaphylaxis, or teachers' recent training in anaphylaxis. Overall, parents' satisfaction surrounding the schools' food allergy management was mixed. Yet they highly appreciated the schools' efforts and practices in preventing the risks of food allergy, for example by identifying affected children and/or raising awareness about food allergies among the school community. Despite these efforts, parents were concerned about their child's overall safety at school, especially in playground and non-routine activities such as school camps and lapses in communication and implementation of state guidelines. To address these concerns, parents suggested many improvements in the schools' practices and guidelines, including proactive communication with parents on matters of food allergy. The implications of these findings for educators, along with recommendations for further research are presented.

Aboriginal Heritage Trails are a growing phenomenon in Australia. They come in all shapes and sizes, from mere signage to--in the case of the famous Lurujarri trail out of Broome, Western Australia--a nine-day immersive experience walking the beach with one of the Goolarabooloo family groups. Here people experience the beautiful Indian Ocean coastline, extensive dinosaur footprints, storytelling, and meals of freshly caught fish, mangrove crab, dugong and turtle. These trails are far more than 'tourism products'. For the Aboriginal families, with all ages present, they enact inter-generational knowledge transfer. Academic disciplines also change when they are 'on Country': Palaeontologists learn that the dinosaur footprints are also the traces of the emu ancestor, "marala," and their discipline adjusts its epistemological parameters accordingly. Aboriginal walking trails have the potential to change every discipline willing to 're-boot' on a territorial, rather than global, scale. Walking with one's arts of paying attention on alert deepens and extends both European and Aboriginal knowledge, as they find agencies that can transfer and translate the multi-functionality inherent in the ecological 'pluriverse' that is this continent-wide network of dreaming tracks. Could this experiential model of knowledge transfer represent a path away from the nineteenth-century model of knowledge collection, storage and display that we find in universities and museums?

Where does our food come from? Such a question may be difficult for some children to answer, especially those living in a city apartment devoid of a backyard with a vegie patch or fruit trees. This article describes a learning experience designed to encourage Year 1 children to think about the foods that humans obtain from plants. The learning experience also provides a good example of authentic integration of the Australian Curriculum learning areas of science (ACARA 2018a) and Technologies (ACARA 2018b).

Journey-based outdoor leaders can be at risk of nutrient deficiencies due to repetitive menus and/or poor dietary practices, with implications for resultant personal health and work performance. Careful meal planning and nutritional understanding can help alleviate this risk. However, overall intakes are also partly dependent on the dietary practices and preferences of outdoor leaders in the field as well as during their days off. This study identifies factors influencing the dietary practices of outdoor leaders from an Australian outdoor education provider and the resultant strategies they implement to manage their diets. Focus groups explored dietary preferences and motivations for dietary practices, with findings corroborated by field observations on two journey-based programs. Inductive thematic analysis identified three key themes influencing the dietary practices of outdoor leaders: food limitations, personal preferences, and social context.

Anthropocentric thinking produces fractured ecological perspectives that perpetuate destructive, wasteful behaviours. Recognition of the relational entanglements of humans and more-than-humans, particularly through our everyday visceral encounters with food, may be able to encourage ethical ecological thinking and practices that lay the foundations for more sustainable lifestyles. This paper explores possible ways embodied, convivial and experimental interactions with food waste and its avoidance -- along with the various assemblages through which it both acts and is enacted -- can support recognition of the entangled relations in which humans and more-than-humans co-become. Excess food, its prevention, reuse and disposal, requires management through intimate human bodily engagements where the very vitality of food is inescapable. The affective force of these necessarily multispecies interactions --which can prompt desires for both attachment and detachment and manifest in a myriad of forms of togetherness -- exposes mutual vulnerabilities in living together. Through analysis of ethnographic data gathered from 38 food-producing gardeners and Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) participants in the Australian Capital Territory, this paper maps out how experimental, playful interactions with leftover, surplus or wasted food could contribute to the development of the skills and competencies necessary for adapting to our contingent futures. Encounters with excess food are shown to be capable of assisting in training sensitivities to become attuned and responsive to our more-than-human entanglements and mutual vulnerabilities. This responsive attunement can induce and support ethico-political beliefs and practices that have the potential to disrupt anthropocentric thinking.

Building on the success of the SNAC (Supporting Nutrition Australian Childcare) community, a comprehensive online programme SNACPlus provided professional development (PD) and resources to embed nutrition curriculum and supportive food environments in Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) services. Process and impact evaluation were conducted to determine the effectiveness of this intervention programme. Participants were recruited from nine long-day-care (LDC) centres and the current SNAC membership list. Resource access was monitored using web analytics. Changes in nutrition knowledge, attitudes, behaviours and food environment were measured using baseline (comparator group, n=100) and post-intervention surveys (intervention group, n=80), contextualised through open-ended questions. The majority of comparator participants perceived nutritious food provision as important yet lacked confidence about estimating serve sizes. Adjusting for years of experience, the intervention significantly influenced educators' confidence about servings of grains (p=0.034), dairy (p=0.015), low fat meat (p=0.014) and food group servings estimation knowledge (p<0.001). Intervention participants accessed credible websites and health professionals for nutrition knowledge; reported SNACPlus positively influenced changes to food service and role-modelling; and knowledge, attitudes and behaviours improved at organisational and individual levels. SNACPlus provides online nutrition curriculum resources that positively impacted knowledge, attitudes and behaviours of ECEC staff and influenced systematic changes in food environments. Practice and policy implementation that includes all systems within the early years setting will help initiate and maintain healthy food environments.

The increasing emphasis on embedding work-integrated learning (WIL) in the higher education curriculum has impacted on teaching and learning approaches. While the benefits of incorporating experiential learning in the student experience are recognized by all stakeholders, additional costs incurred by students have not been identified. At the same time the Australian Federal Government's review of base funding has recommended a detailed assessment of the costs of providing student placements across all disciplines - in particular health and education. Data collected from over a thousand Australian Collaborative Education Network (ACEN) student scholarship applicants indicate travel, accommodation, food, clothing, equipment and loss of income are of major concern especially for students on mandatory, lengthy placements involving relocation. We present a range of data from the five-years of the scholarship to inform discussion of costs from the student perspective which highlighted major concerns. The implications for ACEN are described and recommendations made to improve practice.

Can community and school gardens help people learn to build social resilience to potential food shortages? We seek to address this question through an examination of the ways in which gardens can teach individual and community resiliency in times of emergency, pockets of food insecurity, and the challenges presented by climate change. We focus on the role gardens play in providing access to food and building resilience amongst school-aged children and young adults. A larger Australian PhD thesis is analyzed to provide insights to assist educators, particularly in the policy arena, who are seeking to engage with, or who already engage with, young learners in community and school gardens. While the focus is on the Australian context, we argue that our findings have international relevance.

Purpose: Health literacy is a key international public health goal. Conceptualising health literacy as an asset highlights the importance of fostering a health literate youth for the benefit of future generations, yet research has predominantly focused on examining adults' and older adolescents' health literacy. This presents a gap for child-centred studies with younger populations. The purpose of this paper is to report the findings from a qualitative study that explored health literacy, in a nutrition context (i.e. nutrition literacy), from primary school children's perspectives. Design/methodology/approach: The study examined children's experiences in accessing, understanding and interacting with nutrition information. In doing so, the research employed a socio-ecological framework to understand facilitators and barriers that can influence children's nutrition literacy. Preadolescent boys and girls aged 11-12 years were invited to take part in the study. At the time of recruitment, students were attending one of three state government schools in a socioeconomically disadvantaged region of metropolitan South Australia. A series of focus groups and individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with 38 participants. Interview data were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim and analysed using thematic techniques. Findings: Children demonstrated that they accessed and interacted with a variety of sources of nutrition information. Nutrition understandings were derived from the home, school and media environments. Parents and teachers were cited as key influences on children's interactions with nutrition information and children particularly emphasised the trust placed in their teachers as health "experts." While the home and school environments emerged as potential settings to develop children's nutrition literacy skills, the children's narratives also alluded to potential barriers surrounding nutrition literacy. Originality/value: This study provides further insight into children's nutrition literacy. While functional nutrition literacy remains a fundamental starting point, children are interested in opportunities to develop more interactive skills, such as those related to cooking. Opportunities also exist to foster more critical competencies. This research thereby highlights the importance of more integrated strategies to promote nutrition literacy among this population group across multiple settings.

Multicultural Days are a regular event in Australian schools. While they are viewed as a vehicle for cultural inclusion and strengthening community, they have long been critiqued for their avoidance of a more critical engagement with deeper issues around cultural complexity. The intent of this paper is not simply to add to this critique but to understand why such forms of lazy multiculturalism persist in schools. Taking an ethnographic orientation to the field of multicultural education, it examines one school's approach to the Multicultural Day. The paper considers how, despite engaging in professional learning designed to challenge established practice in this area, teachers resisted the intellectual task of doing diversity differently. The ethnographic methods used in the study not only allowed for an examination of the practices this school engaged in, they drew attention to how teachers might modify their practice and develop a deeper understanding of cultural complexity.

Purpose: Teachers disseminate food knowledge and skills in secondary school curricula that provide essential skills for a healthy life. The purpose of this paper is to explore Australian secondary school teachers' views of healthy eating and their sources of information in planning their food, nutrition and health curriculum. Design/methodology/approach: Secondary school teachers' perceptions were explored through semi-structured, in-depth interviews that were de-identified and transcribed verbatim. Codes were ascribed to sections of the transcripts and throughout the process of inductive thematic analysis. The teachers' responses were grouped into five main themes: approaches to teaching healthy eating, sources of food and nutrition information, curriculum planning, teaching goals and teacher career influences. Findings: The teachers were clear about the aims and importance of teaching healthy eating in an experiential curriculum. They reported that teaching healthy eating assists the health and well--being of adolescents and their families. The effectiveness of current teaching in Australian secondary schools may be compromised by the positioning of food, nutrition and health topics in two separate curriculum areas: technologies and health and physical education, and competing school priorities and resources that limit the students' exposures to food curricula. The teachers sourced food information from online websites, popular culture and social media. Their knowledge and views of healthy eating appeared to be associated with their interests, life experiences, education and employment histories. Practical implications: These findings can assist with health promotion and education policy development. They can assist the design of healthy eating curriculum approaches for secondary schools and professional development courses for teachers, which will foster healthy food habits for adolescents, and their families in the future. Originality/value: Secondary school teacher perceptions of the place of healthy eating in food, and nutrition curricula have been under examined.

Objective: To examine whether the completion of a course of study relating to preventive health and lifestyle risk factors was associated with alterations in health behaviours. Design: Within-group intervention, repeated-measures design. Setting: Health behaviours of university students studying a course focused on health and well-being. Method: Undergraduate university students (n = 56) completed a questionnaire assessing health behaviours at the start and end of a course which was oriented towards a healthy lifestyle, concentrating on preventive health and lifestyle risk factors. Beliefs about the importance of various health behaviours addressed within the course content were also assessed. Results: Physical activity was unaltered across the duration of the course, while a number of dietary behaviours were improved, including an increase in the weekly frequency of eating breakfast, reduced frequency of adding salt to meals, increased frequency of choosing reduced fat dairy options, reduced frequency of consuming drinks with added sugar, and consuming alcohol (p = 0.05). Conclusion: Health-focused course content may benefit students through the knowledge gained that can be applied in future professional settings and also via positive alterations in their own health behaviours. These positive influences on health behaviour in early adulthood may have implications for lifelong health and well-being.

Adolescent boys living in disadvantaged communities are considered a vulnerable group at risk for developing obesity and associated health problems, such as cardiovascular disease, hypertension and type-2 diabetes. While short-term health promotion programmes often produce effective results during the implementation of the intervention, according to self-determination theory (SDT), changes in autonomous motivation are required if programmes are to have sustained effects on health behaviours. This article describes the ATLAS (Active Teen Leaders Avoiding Screen-time) programme, based on SDT, which was developed to engage adolescent boys from low socio-economic backgrounds in physical activity, reduce their consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages and limit recreational screen-time. The article reports a post-hoc analysis of the perceptions and experiences of a representative group of ATLAS participants to investigate whether the boys' general impressions of the programme reflected the need-supportive teaching strategies on which the programme was based. The results of this analysis suggested that students' comments about increased feelings of autonomy, competence and relatedness were often linked to corresponding need-supportive teacher behaviours. The findings suggest that embedding health promotion programmes in a need-supportive context can help to foster the motivation and self-regulation that is required to maintain newly adopted healthier behaviours.

There has been much political and educational focus on Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) in Australian schools in recent years and while there has been significant research examining science and mathematics enrolments in senior high school, little is known about the corresponding trends in Technologies and engineering. Understanding these subjects is essential for educators and policy-makers alike if Australians are to embrace the challenges of an innovation economy. We have collected raw enrolment data from each of the Australian state and territory education departments from 1992 to 2014 and analysed this across five Technology and Engineering subject areas. We also consider some of the relationships between these subject areas and other areas of the STEM equation. The results of these analyses are discussed in terms of absolute enrolments, participation rates and sex balance. We have found that the total number of students in Year 12 increased year on year and that this growth is echoed, to a lesser extent, in the participation rates for design technology, food technology and engineering. Digital Technologies however, grew rapidly until 2000, after which time it has been in steady decline. We identify that while the trends mostly show growth, there is a concerning male bias to many of these subject areas. We suggest that the broadening of the upper high school curriculum, confusion surrounding vocational training enrolments, and gamesmanship of the university entrance system, may be contributing to the limited growth observed. Finally, we identify a number of important areas for further research in this key learning area.

Background: The purpose of this study was to determine whether there was an association between dietary patterns and children's academic performance. Methods: This cross-sectional study involved 315 children aged 9-11 years from 26 schools in Australia. Academic performance was measured in 4 domains (reading, writing, numeracy, and language--subdomains: spelling, grammar, and punctuation) using the National Assessment Program in Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN). A self-reported child questionnaire collected dietary intake data. "Core" (healthy) and "noncore" (unhealthy) dietary patterns were derived using principal components analysis. Results: The noncore pattern was associated with lower NAPLAN scores across all academic domains (mean: -12.6, 95% CI: -18.7 to -6.4, r[superscript 2] = 0.073, p < 0.001) except writing, while the core foods pattern was not associated with NAPLAN scores across all domains. When the noncore model was adjusted for sociodemographic covariates (child body mass index, ethnicity, sex, parental education, household income, marital status, mother's employment hours, and number of siblings), the association was attenuated but remained statistically significant (NAPLAN summary score: -8.5, 95% CI -15.0 to -1.9, r[superscript 2] = 0.123, p = 0.011). Conclusions: Academic performance was deleteriously associated with a nutrient-poor, energy-dense diet, yet not associated with a nutritious diet.

There has been a recent surge of interest in cooking skills in a diverse range of fields, such as health, education and public policy. There appears to be an assumption that cooking skills are in decline and that this is having an adverse impact on individual health and well-being, and family wholesomeness. The problematisation of cooking skills is not new, and can be seen in a number of historical developments that have specified particular pedagogies about food and eating. The purpose of this paper is to examine pedagogies on cooking skills and the importance accorded them. The paper draws on Foucault's work on governmentality. By using examples from the USA, UK and Australia, the paper demonstrates the ways that authoritative discourses on the know how and the know what about food and cooking--called here "savoir fare"--are developed and promulgated. These discourses, and the moral panics in which they are embedded, require individuals to make choices about what to cook and how to cook, and in doing so establish moral pedagogies concerning good and bad cooking. The development of food literacy programmes, which see cooking skills as life skills, further extends the obligations to "cook properly" to wider populations. The emphasis on cooking knowledge and skills has ushered in new forms of government, firstly, through a relationship between expertise and politics which is readily visible through the authority that underpins the need to develop skills in food provisioning and preparation; secondly, through a new pluralisation of "social" technologies which invites a range of private-public interest through, for example, television cooking programmes featuring cooking skills, albeit it set in a particular milieu of entertainment; and lastly, through a new specification of the subject can be seen in the formation of a choosing subject, one which has to problematise food choice in relation to expert advice and guidance. A governmentality focus shows that as discourses develop about what is the correct level of "savoir fare", new discursive subject positions are opened up. Armed with the understanding of what is considered expert-endorsed acceptable food knowledge, subjects judge themselves through self-surveillance. The result is a powerful food and family morality that is both disciplined and disciplinary.

This paper explores the way learning to cook remains important for the maintenance of "ethnic" food traditions and how sharing food knowledge plays a role in intercultural exchanges. Ethnographic data from an ongoing study in Melbourne is presented to highlight how, in everyday practices, both tradition and innovation are involved in learning experiences related to cooking. Using an everyday multiculturalism perspective, the study was designed to investigate the resilience of ethnic food cultures in the face of increasing industrialisation in global food systems. In this paper, I focus in particular on the interplay between tradition and innovation in everyday settings by drawing closely on three women's accounts of cooking and learning. The women remain attached to the food traditions they learned by observing and taking part in daily routines of meal preparation and they stress that many of these practices need to be preserved. At the same time, their accounts reveal how everyday settings can be considered as "pedagogical spaces" where opportunities for innovation arise and new knowledge about food and cooking can be acquired. Families, schools, travel, workplaces and neighbourhood networks emerged as sites where traditional food knowledge can be shared and new skills developed. The paper contributes to our understanding of food pedagogies by highlighting the dynamic relationship between tradition and innovation in everyday, mundane encounters and exchanges in multicultural societies.

Over the past decade the issue of food and in particular, food consumed within schools has come to encapsulate a broad range of concerns regarding children and young people's health and wellbeing. In Australia, the UK and more recently the USA, attempts to ameliorate a range of public health concerns have provided the impetus for an unprecedented proliferation of school food initiatives and legislative reforms governing the types of foods that may or may not be provided within schools. While academic enquiry in this area has largely focussed upon attempts to govern children, recent initiatives in the UK and Australia have begun to target parents in their attempts to promote healthy food practices. In this paper we interrogate the ways in which parents, or more specifically, mothers are positioned in relation to school food discourses in Australia and in the UK and suggest that school food has become a site through which an array of pedagogical opportunities are opened up to invoke particular subject positions premised on normative views of affective middle class motherhood. In short, we seek to explore the means through which mothers come to be regarded as legitimate targets of school food pedagogy. The paper draws on empirical data from Australia and the UK to compare a range of pedagogic techniques employed in the two countries. Drawing on governmentality studies we explore how school food pedagogies seek to regulate mothers and their children's food related choices. We consider school lunches and the various techniques that have been deployed in both countries to consider the moralising work that takes place around food and motherhood. (Contains 1 figure and 1 footnote.)