Peer-reviewed article
Applying the Ottawa Charter to evaluate health literacy outcomes of the Little Aussie Bugs course for Australian early childhood educators.
Ruscoe A, Cook EJ, O'Brien EK, Costello L, Kirk G et al. ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study evaluated the Little Aussie Bugs course, a professional development programme that teaches early childhood educators in Australia to deliver health literacy lessons on hygiene, nutrition, and oral health to young children. The course used dialogic reading and online learning to support educators. The evaluation found that educators significantly improved their health literacy knowledge and confidence, and successfully integrated these topics into daily routines with children.
Key points
- Educators showed statistically significant improvements in overall health literacy scores after the course
- Educators reported increased confidence in using dialogic reading to deliver health messages
- Educators successfully embedded health learning into daily routines and reported enhanced capability to support children's understanding of health behaviours
- The course strengthened educator confidence and improved family communications about health
- The evaluation identified structural gaps in policy alignment and equitable implementation that could affect sustainability
Limitations
The study does not report direct measurement of children's health literacy outcomes or behavioural changes; it focuses only on educator knowledge and confidence. The document does not provide details on sample size, comparison group, or whether outcomes were sustained over time.
Abstract
Early childhood offers an important opportunity to lay the foundations for lifelong health literacy. The Little Aussie Bugs (LAB) dialogic book series and online professional development (PD) course were designed to support Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) educators to embed health literacy concepts, including hygiene, healthy eating, and oral health, into everyday learning routines. This mixed methods study evaluated the course pilot and examined its contribution through the lens of the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion-a framework comprising five interrelated action areas: building healthy public policy; creating supportive environments; strengthening community action; developing personal skills; and reorienting health services. Quantitative findings demonstrated statistically significant improvements in educators' overall health literacy scores and confidence using dialogic reading to deliver health messages. Educators reported enhanced capability to support children's understanding of health behaviors. Qualitative findings revealed educators' experiences embedding learning and LAB resources into daily routines, strengthening their confidence, supporting communications with families, and aligning practice with policy and accreditation expectations. Applying the Charter sharpened research insights into how the intervention developed personal skills and created supportive environments, while also illuminating structural gaps in policy alignment, educator training, and equitable implementation. This evaluation demonstrates how applying the Charter can support analysis of digital, early-years health promotion initiatives and help identify system-level supports for their sustainability. It also shows the course is an accessible and scalable approach to embed health literacy across ECEC settings. Implications for early-years PD and health literacy practice are discussed through the lens of the Charter.
Findings the Hub has extracted
Each claim below is labelled by its type of design and links back to this report.
- Intervention
- Little Aussie Bugs online professional development course combining dialogic book series and online learning for early childhood educators
- Population
- Early childhood education and care educators in Australia
Key finding
Statistically significant improvements in educators' overall health literacy scores