NUTRITION EDUCATION
AND THE TECHNOLOGY LEARNING AREA
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Can I do
anything to help in the technology learning area?
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If they would
just practise what I teach them
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How can I help
them change their behaviours?
They just
don't apply what they learn
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But they know
what a healthy diet is!
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This paper will:
- outline key concepts for school-based
nutrition education which empowers students to have a
healthy diet, and empowers them to create an environment
in which healthy food choices are promoted; and
- illustrate how these key concepts can
be applied to the technology learning area.
In so doing it will demonstrate how an
empowerment approach to food and nutrition education in the
technology learning area is supportive of students
developing appropriate technologies for themselves, their
families and their communities.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Technology Education Sub Committee of the Home Economics
Institute of Australia (HEIA) would like to acknowledge the
encouragement and financial support of the Technology Education
Federation of Australia (TEFA) in the development of this paper. It
would also like to acknowledge the following people who were most
closely associated with the development of the paper:
Management:
Marilyn Yates, HEIA (convenor of the Technology
Education Sub Committee)
Writer:
Jan Reynolds, HEIA (convenor of the Education Standing
Committee)
Consultative Committee:
Christine Brown, HEIA(NT)
Carol Elias, HEIA(WA)
Joanne Jayne, HEIA(Qld)
Gail Major, HEIA(Vic)
Heather Tucker, HEIA(SA)
It is also acknowledged that Jan Reynolds retains the
intellectual ownership of this paper.
NUTRITION EDUCATION
AND THE TECHNOLOGY LEARNING AREA
CONTENTS
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- Technology - meeting human needs - food needs
- No easy answers
- It's easier to KNOW than to DO
- Helping them DO as well as KNOW - can it be done?
- Nutrition education was not working
- National Nutrition Education in Schools project -
developing a new approach
- Concepts for HEALTHY BEHAVIOURS
- Making changes to their own diet
- Bringing about change in the community
- Teachers can develop essential skills and
understandings
- Links with the nationally developed curriculum
Key Concept 1 - Health is
multi-dimensional
Key Concept 2 - Autonomy and
empowerment
- Control over what they eat
- Control over factors which influence what they and others
eat
- Autonomy can be developed at school
- There is an approach to help develop student autonomy - an
empowerment approach
- Empowerment
- An empowerment process for students
- The steps in the process are linked
- Empowerment for a healthy personal diet
- Empowerment to promote a society which makes healthy food
choices easy choices
Key Concept 3 - Learning and
teaching
- Making the curriculum relevant to the students
- Co-operative learning
- Developing a deep understanding of concepts and
processes
- Metacognition
- Giving students opportunity to bring about change in a
range of contexts
Key Concept 4 - Key skills
- Food selection
- Food preparation
- Advocacy
Key Concept 5 - Principles of
inclusiveness
- Diversity
- Social justice
- Supportive environments
Links with three learning areas
- Nationally developed curriculum
- Process links
- Contextual links of nutrition education with the learning
areas
Cross-curricula approaches
- Integrated approach
- A multi-disciplinary approach
- Cross-learning area approach within one subject
Why technology?
- The need to develop appropriate technologies
- Home economics curriculum paths
Linking an empowerment approach to
food and nutrition education with the technology learning
area
- What is technology education?
- Is technology education empowering? Can it be?
- Four basic steps for empowerment education
- Identifying the problem
- Analysing the root causes of the problem
- Arriving at group goals and analysing the factors impacting
on them
- Action
- Summarising empowerment education
Applying empowerment education to
technology education with respect to food and nutrition
education
Developing autonomy with respect to
personal health-promoting food-related behaviours
Developing a society whereby healthy
choices are easy choices
A reflection of the Key Concepts when
applied to the technology learning area
- Health is multi-dimensional
- Autonomy and empowerment
- Learning and teaching
- Key skills
- Principles of inclusiveness
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