Beyond the pyramid or plate: contemporary approaches to Food and Nutrition education

Nutrition has long been a topic in health education, with a plethora of associated advocacy, marketing and teaching resources. Many of these resources provide a variation on the same theme of either the food plate, pyramid or the Australian Guide to Healthy Eating (AGHE). However, in new curricular times, the focus area of Food and Nutrition has evolved in step with broader health education outcomes. The inclusion of food signifies that health education is not merely about teaching children and young people the nutritional values and guidelines, but also about food literacy and food studies more broadly. In this paper, we provide 5 guidelines to help support the planning and programming of a contemporary approach to food and nutrition. These include: (i) to start with the HPE Propositions (or Key Ideas), capabilities and cross-curriculum priorities; (ii) situating nutrition as one component within a broader food studies and literacy and agenda; (iii) Make links to agriculture, ‘bush tucker’, growing,
harvesting and cooking experiments; (iv) plan for community and place based links to culture and history, museums and online media; (v) critically examine who makes and or sells the resources (and knowledge). We provide a number of examples to conceptually and practically support the implementation of this focus area rich in educative potential.