March 2023

St Brendan’s Catholic Primary School

Schools Implementing healthy changes Promoting healthy eating
kid in a veggie patch

Overview

St Brendan’s Catholic Primary School is supporting healthy eating messages by involving students, staff and the wider community in a kitchen garden program.

Student health and wellbeing is important to the school, which is supported to run the program by Gippsland Lakes Community Health, Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation and the Victorian Government’s Achievement Program.



Take a look at some of the great work that they have achieved in the first 18 months in the video!

View video transcript

[Text displayed on screen]  St Brendan’s Catholic Primary School, Making Healthy Lifestyle Choices.  

[Student] I remember the old garden. It was just a bunch of dirt. There wasn’t really a garden. But now we’ve got plants, food to grow. What happens now? What do we do with this cookie?  

[Matthew, Principal] So basically every day we’re managing to get six or seven students through and they’re either gardening or they’re cooking. And then, of course, you know, cooking for reasons.  

So these guys get to taste healthy food and new things they wouldn’t always taste.  

[Melissa, Parent] Having the kids be a part of the process of making their food, getting to school and opening up their lunchbox at snack time, saying, like, I made this muesli bar, or I made these muffins, or I made this scroll, or look at the bread that I’ve made.  

We’ve made this butter. And so for us, it’s been about just getting our resources together. We’ve begun putting a shed out the back there for growing seedlings in.  

[Student] We do recycled wood, plastic bottles so we have a place to grow the seedlings. We’ve also put the right people in the right positions.  

[Principal] And Mike staff member, who had several talents in that area, has been able to take his kitchen skills and gardening skills and combine them. We have a system here at school where we supply meals to families in need.  

Some situation where the family is finding it a bit difficult to eat properly.  

So there’s always a meal there for anybody that requires one.  

[Student] One time we made sausage rolls and I didn’t realize how many different veggies went into it. 

And I ended up eating beetroot in it or something as well. And it actually tasted really, really good.  

[Matthew, Principal] Without the community’s help, we really we can’t do it because, you know, one person is not enough and we need that community support to do so.  

[Teacher] The biggest problem I have is getting the produce to the kitchen before they eat. I have advice. 

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