Education for Sustainability in primary health education

Abstract

Health is a fundamentally important concept for sustain ability of society into the future. For a healthy society we need healthy individuals within a healthy environment. And the choice of what we take into our bodies, our outlook and our lifestyles have direct impact on our individual health, as well as having social and environmental implications. Choices concerning our health have great implications for sustainability because of the wide ramifications and effects of these choices; therefore, student, need experiences that make them aware of the consequences of outlook and lifestyles on their inner and outer environment. Health education for Education for Sustainability (EfS) involves developing understanding about how our bodies work, so that we can understand how health can be maintained or damaged, as well as understanding about the social, economic, political and environmental influences and impact of lifestyle choices. In this way, health education for EfS is essentially cross-curricular, and links scientific knowledge with social and environmental impact through the ethics and consequences of various forms of action. To promote meaningful learning to inform action for health, teaching approaches should generally follow a constructivist model (Littledyke & Huxford 1998; Skamp 2008) where children's views and experiences are drawn on in teaching to challenge and extend their understanding, and learning is essentially through enquiry and investigation (see chapters 3 and 6).