BACKGROUND

Healthy Active Learning is a voluntary initiative, at no cost to schools, kura and early learning services. It contributes to one of the Government’s key priorities – improving the wellbeing of children and young people – and is part of the Government’s Child and Youth Wellbeing Strategy.

The initiative began in January 2020, and has three components to drive better education and health outcomes for young New Zealanders: 

• New Health and Physical Education and Hauora curriculum resources (Ministry of Education) 
• Toolkits and a health promotion workforce to support the adoption and implementation of healthy food and water-only policies (Ministry of Health) 
• A physical activity workforce (Sport NZ) ​​​​​​​

THE INITIATIVE

​​​​​​​Healthy Active Learning is focused on providing tamariki with quality physical experiences and supporting schools in delivering healthy food and water only policies. It’s based on a successful pilot programme and in 2020 it was rolled out to 300 schools nationwide. In 2022 the initiative will be expanded to 800 schools. 

Sport Canterbury’s Healthy Active Learning team brought together teachers from across Waitaha Canterbury to discuss best practice, share ideas and hear firsthand examples of quality play, active recreation and physical activity opportunities for tamariki in our region.