Examining the role of school health promotion and its connection to teacher action

• In Event: Repairing the Educational Landscape: Equipping Teachers to Promote Student Well-Being for Democratic and Flourishing Societies

Abstract

Objectives: Can health-promoting schools renew democratic principles of student agency and participation? If ‘Democracy has to be born anew every generation, and education is its midwife‘ teachers’ have an opportunity to engage in health promotion to build flourishing communities. This paper aims to examine the readiness of preservice teachers to engage in school health promotion, by investigating their knowledge of health promotion and their engagement in wellbeing support activities (e.g. comforting a student in distress) during placement training experiences.

Theoretical Framework: In 2021, WHO and UNESCO released new global standards for health-promoting schools. The standards reinforce a Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory and whole-school approach to health promotion and highlight recognition of the need to focus on more consistent and quality implementation of health promotion to realise its potential to fully support student and teacher wellbeing (Sawyer, Raniti & Aston, 2021). Accordingly, exploring preservice teachers’ sense of their own role and preparedness to engage in school health promotion as a part of providing comprehensive education, is particularly timely.

Methods: A cross-sectional and descriptive survey methodology was employed in this study. The online survey was designed and piloted with preservice and practicing teachers. The survey was delivered via Qualtrics and included a combination of Likert-scale and open-ended questions.

Data Sources: 178 preservice teachers completed the online survey. They were all enrolled in the Master of Teaching (primary and secondary) at the University of Melbourne, Australia. The questions captured their attitudes towards health promotion (and whether this was influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic), their knowledge of how to implement health promotion, and their engagement in wellbeing support activities during their placements in schools.

Results: The findings illustrated that participating preservice teachers hold considerable knowledge of health promotion. Still, they feel they need more preparation to engage in actions that can support the wellbeing of students. While these findings likely reflect the career stage of these future teachers, they also highlight the importance of orienting training towards health promotion practice, particularly clarifying teachers’ classroom actions that can reinforce broader school health promotion initiatives.

Scholarly Significance: Recent research and education reforms to drive change have focussed on wellbeing, and consequently, many wellbeing support activities are occurring in Australian schools. While this is encouraging, the research highlights how important it is for health promotion activities to be mutually reinforcing, that is, for messages about how to support health and wellbeing to be consistent whether an activity is focussed upon reducing screen time or stress management, for example (Wolfenden et al., 2022). Accordingly, the teachers’ role to offer this clarity and engage in a whole-school approach to supporting wellbeing critical. This study has contributed evidence about the degree to which preservice teachers feel a sense of readiness to do so, and highlighted priority areas for initial teacher education to enhance to increase the likelihood that newly graduated teachers can implement quality and consistent health promotion.

Author

• Ruth Aston, University of Adelaide