Fruit in Schools

Case studies

Developing a healthy environment at Porirua School

• Introducing Porirua School
• The fit between FIS and school culture and practices
• FIS and school health initiatives
• Student perspectives
• Connecting with parents and whānau
• Challenges
• Sustainability and where to next?

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Introducing Porirua School

Porirua School is the oldest school in the Porirua basin (an urban area located in the greater Wellington region). The school is a contributing school, and has a growing roll, currently about 230 students, of whom about two-thirds are Māori, one-fifth are Pasifika, and one-tenth are NZ European. The school serves a diverse community, and has bilingual and mainstream classes. Porirua School was recently upgraded to decile 3, and is a Phase 1 FIS school.

The school’s mission statement is:

Porirua School aims to have happy, healthy students who enjoy learning with the encouragement and support of the many cultures reflected in the school community.

Staff noted that, although this statement was developed a number of years ago, it still held currency and was a “blueprint for action” that underpinned all aspects of the school programme, and encouraged staff to prioritise student health and wellbeing. Child obesity has been a concern for a number of years and, prior to FIS, was the driving factor behind a number of healthy eating and physical activity initiatives at the school.

The fit between FIS and school culture and practices

A number of features of the school culture and foci are supporting FIS goals to be incorporated into the daily life of the school. These are described below.

Developing a critical mass of committed staff

At Porirua School, three staff members are driving FIS and an enviroschools initiative. The acting DP is the Health and PE curriculum leader and has oversight of FIS. Two other teachers share the responsibility for an enviroschools programme. These staff members have been allocated “R” management units¹ and their work is strongly supported by the principal and the BoT. These staff noted that it was important to have a critical mass of staff driving activities, given the time it could take, and to encourage practices to spread across the school.

Wellbeing

As part of the school focus on health, staff have started to look at health more holistically; as encompassing emotional and social wellbeing as well as physical health. The school started the Mentally-Healthy Schools contract (which is currently being refocused), and has been involved in a number of other initiatives such as Kia Kaha², the Keeping Ourselves Safe³ programme, and a road safety programme. As a result of this, Porirua School is developing an approach which centres on increasing students’ wellbeing and supporting them to make good choices and develop strategies for coping with failure and change. Taking responsibility for the health of the environment is also a focus. Student-centred practice underpins the school’s approach, and staff encourage students to be leaders, and have ownership over their learning and choices. The focus on wellbeing includes an emphasis on celebrating students’ successes and strengthening the connections made with students’ backgrounds and culture by, for example, making connections with the local marae. A school-wide approach to behaviour management is another aspect. Discussions with students focus on the choices they make and the identification of good choices. Staff noted the synergies between their approach and the FIS focus on making healthy choices.

Using whole-school themes to explore the “big picture”

At Porirua School the curriculum is structured around year-long whole-school integrated themes. School leaders noted that one reason they were so enthusiastic about FIS was that it connected and enhanced existing and planned themes. In 2005 the theme was “Enviro-kids”. As students undertook activities around this theme they became interested in recycling. As a result, a system of three rubbish bins was set up in each class and kerbside recycling bins were obtained from the local council. The increase in fruit scraps from FIS gave the raw materials to develop a dream of a compost system and worm farm. Through these initiatives the school aimed to foster students’ sense of protecting the environment, and reduce the amount spent on rubbish removal.

In 2006, the main focus was on the Health and PE curriculum and the theme: “Healthy and happy”. This theme connected emotional, social, and physical wellbeing and was wide enough in scope for teachers to continue their enviro-focus as well as weave in the FIS health areas. In Term 1, the initial focus was personal wellbeing and interactions within the classroom. In Term 2 the school looked at health and wellbeing in the local community, and in Term 3, NZ and the world.

In 2006, the school continued to develop their recycling initiative, with two teachers and about 35 students forming an enviro-kids group. Students were rostered onto duties which included fruit monitoring, monitoring school rubbish levels, and managing the recycling scheme, compost bins (as shown in Figure 1), and worm farm.

Figure 1 Porirua School compost bins


Students also engaged in other activities such as using their compost to plant 20 trees provided by the local council for Arbor Day. Staff reported that students were “really dedicated” to the recycling scheme and got very disappointed if school rubbish levels rose.

Staff noted that HPS and the enviroschools model are both very student-driven, and FIS and the recycling initiative provided a number of new opportunities for students to develop leadership skills. For example, as a result of their environmental work, students wrote a successful application for a bronze enviroschools award. In the future, students were planning to write to United Fresh to suggest some ideas for downsizing fruit wrapping.

The 2007 theme, “Clearer communicators”, is technology- and ICT-based. As part of this theme it is planned that students will explore how to spread health messages (with a focus on sunsmart), and market the by-products of their recycling scheme to make it self-sustaining.

Building connections with the local community

An emphasis on making links with local schools and the community to support their initiatives is a feature of the Porirua School culture. Through their environmental work the school has made a number of connections with local business people and representatives from local and regional councils. A local “worm man” assists the school with the worm farm, and students visit Trash Palace (a recycling depot run by Porirua City Council) to learn about recycling. The school also has a connection with the Zero Waste co-ordinator at the local council. Staff noted that all these people are very supportive, understand schools, and assist them in organising student visits. The school also makes use of local resources within walking distance. These include the Pataka museum and gallery, and the Porirua library and recreation centre.

The school has a strong connection with the local Ngāti Toa marae. Most of the Māori students at the school are affiliated to this marae, and the school follows their kawa. The school also has strong links with local early childhood, primary, intermediate, and secondary schools which are fostered through the Porirua cluster. A recent focus of this cluster has been improving literacy and numeracy practice.

FIS and school health initiatives

The students, school leaders, and teachers we talked to all saw FIS to be about giving students new experiences and knowledge that could potentially “break the cycle” of poor nutrition and health in the community and provide students with the lifelong learning skills and information they need to make healthy choices.

Staff perceived the relationship building that is occurring with health promoters to be a key benefit of FIS. Prior to FIS, the school had developed relationships with the local PHN, the Mentally-Healthy Schools contractors, the Police, and Life Education bus staff. As a result of their environmental focus the school developed new connections with the staff from local and regional councils. Through FIS, their PHN and FISC facilitated connections with a number of other health promoters including representatives from the Heart Foundation, the Push Play team from SPARC, and the Cancer Society. The FIS lead teacher noted that FIS supports these agencies to be more aware of each other’s practices which places them in a better position to support schools.

The relationship building and sharing that occurs between schools at cluster meetings is also an important aspect of FIS:

I think the best thing is you have all those teachers there…everyone’s really open about sharing ideas.

The FIS teacher attends these cluster meetings and PD sessions are planned at the school so she can share the ideas she gains. This teacher considered the local FISC worked hard at organising the cluster sessions, finding guest speakers to share information that might be useful to schools, and taking the cluster on visits to local schools to see their initiatives in action.

In 2006, the school’s priorities centred on healthy eating (and its connections to their enviroschools focus) and physical activity, with a smaller focus on sunsmart and smokefree practices. The school is working towards making changes in these areas at various levels of the school system. The main initiatives are described below.

Healthy eating

Prior to FIS, concern about child obesity led staff to develop nutrition policies and practices. The school has a “water-only” policy, and fizzy drink as well as lollies, chippies, and pies are banned. Staff saw FIS as a catalyst that added impetus to their initiatives and encouraged them to enforce policies. In 2006, the FIS fruit prompted a focus on healthy lunches. Parents were asked to include one more healthy food in students’ lunchboxes, and foods such as sweets and pies were discouraged. Staff also targeted the whānau of students who had very unhealthy lunches, but found that empowering students was more effective than giving messages to whānau:

It puts them [students] more in charge of what’s going into their lunchbox at home.

Modelling by staff of healthy eating, and encouraging parents and whānau to bring healthy food for school events are also part of the school’s approach.

As a result of a prior review of the canteen menu, in 2006 the school applied for, and received, a bronze Heartbeat award from the Heart Foundation. The school also supplies healthy frozen sandwiches to students who come to school with no lunch. Staff find the FIS fruit a useful addition for students who are undernourished. Students are also encouraged to take spare fruit home for their families.

FIS coincided with a change in break times. The school started a system of a “Brainbreak” at 10 am and a “Bodybreak” at 11 am. Fruit and water are offered during the brainbreak. Renaming playtime in this way sent a clear message to students that fruit and water, as well as physical activity, are important for learning.

Staff noted they already taught students about the health messages underpinning FIS, with some commenting they had covered the food pyramid “for ever and a day”. The way FIS supported this teaching with direct action was a key catalyst for change. In one class, students were given points for having healthy lunches and they graphed this data in maths books. FIS also supported coherence between two of the school main foci, healthy eating and enviroschools, with students engaging in activities such as making food pyramids with food wrappings.

Physical activity

Prior to FIS, as a result of the school’s focus on child obesity, the school had developed a strong physical education and activity focus. The range of activities and sports available for students includes a Waka Ama programme run in conjunction with the local marae, kapa haka, cross country, skipping, hockey, soccer, netball, and a Pacific performance group.

Students have four, half-hour physical activity sessions in classtime every week. Staff observed that a large proportion of students play weekend sports. To make the school physical activity sessions more personally meaningful to students, staff decided to connect them to weekend sports. Each term has a different focus. In winter the school makes use of the local recreation centre to cover hockey skills (about one-fifth of the students play weekend hockey), in the soccer and netball season, teachers focus on ball-handling skills. Teachers are careful about making the connections between physical activity and healthy eating as “fuel for exercise”.

To develop a community approach to physical activity, students are mentored by Years 12 and 13 students at a local college as they do Kiwisports. A weekly Jump-Jam session at the local kindergarten, that students and staff participate in, was talked about with enthusiasm by all. These sessions are sometimes visited by the Push Play trailer, and whānau are invited to take part. Staff noted the sessions are well supported by the community, and whānau also support the school’s physical activity programme by coaching sports teams.

Sunsmart

As a result of FIS, the school reactivated their existing sunsmart policies in 2006. These include a sunhat and sunscreen policy for Terms 1 and 4. Each class has a bottle of sunscreen and students are required to wear a sunhat when outside, or stay in the shade. Teachers endeavour to model sunsmart behaviours and noted they had “turned into the hat police” at lunchtime. To reinforce these messages, the FIS lead teacher got resources from the Cancer Society to support teachers to incorporate teaching about the effects of sunburn in the curriculum.

Plans are afoot to increase the amount of shade by using ORRS funding to install new shade coverings. Over the last couple of years the school set of sunhats has dwindled, and the school was trying different avenues to get funding for additional sunhats.

Smokefree

School leaders noted that they had yet to focus on smokefree as part of FIS, but the school has a smokefree policy and learning about smokefree was already part of the school’s programme. Every second year, with support from the Life Education bus, senior students complete a health unit which includes an emphasis on the impact of smoking.

Student perspectives

During our visit to Porirua School we talked to seven of the Years 5 and 6 enviro-kids. These students relished the leadership opportunities that stemmed from recycling and being FIS monitors, and were clearly extremely proud of what they had achieved:

…the teachers thought we deserved our bronze [enviroschools] medal because we did it ourselves!

Students displayed a strong sense of unity in regard to their views on school health- and environment-related activities. They thought learning about these areas was important so they could educate young people, and as they needed to have knowledge to assist them to make healthy choices in the future:

It gets us ready for the future. So if someone tempts you to smoke…you will know the consequences of smoking—like you will get cancer!!

They considered they had learnt from all the school activities, described them as “like fun turned into helping the environment”, and noted the school’s foci gave them the knowledge they needed to make healthy choices for the environment and for themselves, and was prompting changes in their or whānau behaviours. The activities they most connected with change were those that involved them “doing” or taking action.

Through their recycling work, students learnt about working as a team and taking care of the environment. Most had started to use this knowledge at home. With support from parents, two had developed home worm farms, and others were vegetable gardening with their parents or keeping an eye on family recycling. Students were also keen to continue these practices. One who was going to a local intermediate school in 2007 said:

I’m kinda sad that I’m going ‘cause I want to keep on doing it ‘cause you are saving the world from global warming…we are going to try to encourage the [intermediate] teachers to have a worm farm… It’s good to get heaps of schools doing it…

Students described school practices in regard to the four FIS health areas. The focus on fruit and healthy lunch food had led to a number of changes:

Everyone used to bring junk food, but now they bring healthy food.

I have encouraged my dad to buy more fruit and vegetables—especially oranges and carrots.

They observed that other students were very enthusiastic about the fruit, and some who initially had not liked it had eventually changed their views and behaviour:

…at the start of the year every time we asked them if they wanted fruit they said ‘No’. Now they all say ‘Yes’!

Students considered they did a lot of physical activity at school and agreed that “everyone loves PE!”. They thought, because of their better nutrition, they were more active:

Now we are more energetic because of the fruit, and we want to use our energy.

I eat more salad and I’ve lost weight…I do more running around the field and more active PE—that’s how I lost weight.

Students thought the school physical activity focus was teaching them how to keep themselves entertained and active. As a result, most reported they were changing the types of play they did at home: “Me and cousins and big sister go to the park and play more.”

Students described some of the sunsmart practices they had learnt at school; for example, how hats with brims are better protection than caps, and the benefits of sunscreen and protective clothing. They reported that the school enforced a number of sunsmart procedures. Students considered the messages they got from school were also encouraging them to be more careful at home.

Students stated they had not really covered staying smokefree/auahi kore at school, but they did get some information from school and the Life Education bus. The source of information they most often mentioned was TV commercials. Students noted some inconsistencies in the messages they got about smoking: “Our school’s smokefree, but the teachers smoke—they go by the dairy!” Over the last couple of years, since learning about the harmful effects of smoking, those who had whānau who smoked had been trying to influence their behaviour: “I encourage my dad to stop smoking, and he tries hard to.”

Connecting with parents and whānau

In early 2006, the school ran a Health Expo to introduce whānau to FIS and the school’s “Healthy and happy” theme. During this expo staff provided the community with information about FIS and the HPS umbrella. Staff considered this event to be a huge success with about 60 parents (that is, one-quarter of the school) participating. Staff considered a combination of strategies worked together to encourage parents to attend. These included: sending home constant reminders about the event; getting students excited about the event so they could pass on their enthusiasm to their parents; the inclusion of student performances; an opportunity for all to try Jump-Jam; offering a prize of a healthy food hamper to attendees; and offering food (fruit and yogurt) for supper. At the end of this event a whānau member stood up and thanked the school for all their hard work. Staff noted this public display of support was not a usual reaction to school events.

Staff also described other mechanisms the school uses to connect with parents and whānau. Strategies considered effective included: being creative about holding meetings at times that suited working parents; making connections with whānau through the local marae, kindergarten, and through community sport; and variations of the strategies used for the Health Expo such as including performances by students, or offering food. In addition, school newsletters regularly include messages about healthy eating such as the focus on healthy lunches, and staff use an individual education programme (IEP) process to talk to parents about health needs.

Challenges

On becoming part of FIS, the staff at Porirua School were excited by the promise of the initiative, and rushed into exploring a number of approaches. This led to them feeling overwhelmed. They realised they needed to undertake a needs analysis and take a more strategic approach to developing plans that allowed them to cover the FIS areas over a longer time period. Finding the best way to manage the fruit was still a “work in progress”, especially in summer, but overall, staff commented their approaches were gathering momentum.

School leaders identified a need to make FIS more whole-school. At Porirua School, the culture is one of encouraging teachers to follow individual passions. Staff reported that some teachers are not enthusiastic about foci such as enviroschools, or physical activity, as their interests are in other areas, and literacy and numeracy PD is also a priority. Therefore it could be hard to encourage FIS-related practices to spread across the school. School leaders considered their continued focus on FIS, such as planned work towards a silver Heartbeat award, would encourage practices to spread.

Staff noted they had enough resources to assist in teaching about the FIS areas and the environment, but considered they needed release time to fully develop their initiatives. They were looking for grant money to support this.

School leaders noted that the FIS cluster met their needs at the start of the initiative, but it now needed to be taken to the next level. A need to start working on shared goals was identified. Ideas included shared planning of healthy lunchbox units, working together on initiatives for getting parents involved, or focusing as a group on getting sunhat sponsorship.

Staff noted that, like other schools, they found it hard to get parents involved. They would like to get ideas from other schools, and see more sharing by the wider community of the responsibility for spreading health messages. Teachers considered their part of Porirua did not have such a “cohesive community spirit” as other suburbs, and suggested their area could benefit from an event like “Creekfest”. This annual event is held in Cannons Creek (a nearly suburb), and is a celebration of the community that promotes healthy messages. It draws together local community and health services, marae, schools, police, and the council. Teachers considered this has a “huge” impact. Staff also suggested the health goals they are pursuing could be supported by more direct action from local and national government. Actions could include reducing the amount of junk food sold in public places like libraries and swimming pools, placing more recycling bins in public places, and reducing advertising of unhealthy foods. Staff noted that junk food is cheap—therefore incentives that support parents to supply healthier options could be useful.

Sustainability and where to next?

At Porirua School, staff and students show strong support for the FIS initiative and are very positive about the way FIS and their environmental focus interconnect and add value to each other. They are highly committed to continuing the initiatives they are developing. Staff and students consider the school’s environmental focus is resulting in increased awareness about recycling and caring for the environment across the school, and school approaches to nutrition are very successful in changing the food students eat at school. This improved nutrition, especially for some undernourished children, was resulting in improvements in students’ concentration, memory, and behaviour. In addition, some students have lost weight.

All those interviewed would like to see the fruit provision continued after FIS funding ceases. School leaders have not yet explored avenues for this, but consider the local FISC and their community will support them. As a result of the Health Expo, two whānau members have already offered to assist the school to make connections with fruit suppliers they know.

For 2007, plans include spreading FIS practices via schoolwide uptake of the healthy lunches points system and a whole-school PE focus, and continuation of the enviro-kids group. Staff also plan to offer students new leadership opportunities as they work towards silver Heartbeat and enviroschools awards, and start new initiatives such as the “Take action for water” programme run by the Wellington Regional Council. Once the Mentally-Healthy Schools contract is restructured, it is likely that a student wellbeing group will be formed. Strengthening school connections with parents and whānau is also on the agenda. Staff plan to explore models such as the home–school partnership initiative, and ways to target new parents and large families.

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Footnotes

1. Extra funds allocated in the form of salary or release time.
2. www.police.govt.nz/service/yes/nobully/kia_kaha
3. www.police.govt.nz/service/yes/resources/violence/kos.html