The study design was quantitative, descriptive and exploratory. An exploratory study is the extension of descriptive research that focuses more directly on the discovery of relationships, while the exploratory researcher focuses on a phenomenon of interest (Terre Blanche, Durrheim & Painter 2010). The researchers attempted to understand the entirety of a phenomenon, in this case, nutritional knowledge competencies.

This study was conducted in Sekhukhune District in a deep rural area of the Limpopo Province, in which 95% is rural and 5% is urban. The population is 1 076 840, and the district is divided into four local municipalities. This study was conducted in one of the local municipalities called Makhuduthamaga, which is the second largest in Sekhukhune District, having 25% (247 488) people living there. This municipality has 189 villages. It is located 24.7350° S, 29.8352° E – 189 km from Polokwane city. About 38.1% of its population are children aged 0–14 years and there are 151 primary schools. Sepedi is the dominant language (Statistics South Africa 2011).

The target population comprised primary school educators teaching Grades 5–7 learners in public schools in Makhuduthamaga local municipality.

Of the 151 schools in the municipality, 20% (30 schools) were selected for the study using a simple random sampling method. Thus, all educators of the population of Makhuduthamaga local municipality had an equal chance of being selected (De Vos et al. 2012). From the 30 schools used as a sampling frame, purposive sampling was used to select the educators with an estimated 1132 teacher population in the local municipality. All educators from the 30 schools teaching Grades 5–7 were requested to participate in the study, of which 200 educators agreed to participate.

A researcher-administered questionnaire consisted of three main sections, namely (1) socio-demographic information, (2) determinants or factors influencing nutrition knowledge and (3) nutrition knowledge. Socio-demographic information was measured to understand the characteristics of participants; knowledge regarding nutrition was measured to determine the level of knowledge of educators. The questionnaire was developed based on the objectives and reviewed literature related to the study. The questionnaire was developed and implemented in English. Reliability was tested by using a pre-validated questionnaire which was adapted to suit the study and modified based on the comments from the pilot study. The questionnaire was refined for content validity by the inputs from other authors who are experts in nutrition.

The validity of the questionnaire was further verified by conducting a pilot study among 20 educators from three schools in the Makhuduthamaga local municipality. This exercise enabled us to establish validity and to revise the questionnaire. Questions that were confusing were modified. Educators who participated in the pilot study did not form part of the final sample.

The researcher visited each school twice. The first visit was to engage with the school circuit authorities, to introduce the study and ask for permission to conduct the research. During the second visit, the researcher held a meeting with educators to explain the aim, objective and significance of the study, and recruit participants and obtain their consent. The questionnaire was administered to the educators either during the lunch break or after school hours to avoid interruption of lessons. An appropriate time was agreed upon between the researcher and the participants in advance.

The data were captured on a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet by the researcher and exported to the SPSS version 21 for analysis. Descriptive statistics was used to interpret the data according to variables, such as age, marital status, gender, educational level and experience. The presentation of results was in the form of percentages, counts or frequencies, and visually in the form of graphs, tables and charts.

The overall educators’ knowledge of nutrition was classified as poor (0% – 39%), adequate (40% – 59%), more than adequate (60% – 79%) and excellent (80% – 100%). A linear regression analysis was used to determine if there were relationships between independent variables (age, gender, marital status, educational level qualifications). A p-value less than 0.05 was considered significant.

The study comprised 200 educators from 30 schools in the Makhuduthamaga local municipality. Most of the educators were women (66.5%), in the age group of 40–59 years (81.5%) and married (70%). Regarding educational level, 60.5% of the educators had a diploma, while just 0.5% had a master’s degree. Less than half (42%) of the educators had teaching experience of between 21 and 30 years, while 10.5% of the educators had teaching experience of between 31 and 40 years (Table 1).

The majority of the educators (82.5%) had up to five children in their household, while 15.5% had between 6 and 11 children. About half (49.0%) of the educators reported that they had a household family size of 6–10 persons, while 43.0% stated that there were 1–5 persons in their households. Most of the educators (74.0%) stated that a man was the head of their family as compared to 24.5% who stated that a woman was the head of their family. In addition, all the educators revealed that they had a vegetable garden and that they grew the following vegetables: spinach (74.0%), beetroot (71.5%), carrots (69.5%), tomatoes (69.5%), cabbage (69.0%) and onions (66.0%) (Table 2).

This study reports that most educators were aged between 40 and 49 years and had between 14 and 21 years of teaching experience. Female educators made up two-thirds of the sample and approximately 60.5% of the educators had a diploma as their highest qualification.

The family environment is crucial to the success of any nutrition education in schools because the change in food behaviour mainly depends on household food security and parents’ nutritional knowledge, attitudes and practices (Sherman & Muehlhoff 2007), among other factors. The majority of educator families were headed by men and one-fourth of the educators reported that there were approximately 1–6 persons in the household. The majority of the educators were married. Eating patterns are also influenced by the need to negotiate with others in the family about what to eat (Contento et al. 2006).

Slightly more than half of the educators agreed that gender affected their nutrition knowledge. This was questionable because the majority of participants in this study were women. This breakdown was consistent with another research study that reported that women tend to be more knowledgeable about nutrition (Hendrie, Coveney & Cox 2008). This belief was not observed in this study. It should be noted that men were under-represented in this study.

Information from the school environment, classroom curriculum, media, peers, families and communities are necessary for the promotion of nutrition, health knowledge and practice among school children (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations 2006). The educators reported the following as major sources of nutrition information: health workers, magazines, newspapers, and radio and television. The findings agree with those of a study conducted among nutrition educators by Anca Codruta and Alexandra (2005) in South Carolina, who identified books, newspapers and television as their major sources of nutritional knowledge.

In this study, fewer than half of the educators agreed that their training affected their nutrition knowledge, while others disagreed, indicating that their training did not affect their nutrition knowledge. Studies by Kupolati et al. (2015) and Oldewage-Theron and Napier (2011) showed that teachers required training on nutrition education. Poor nutrition knowledge and training is one of the main factors in the development of malnutrition and needs to be addressed (Briggs et al. 2010).

Food choices and eating patterns are also influenced by the need to negotiate with others in the family about what to buy or eat (Contento et al. 2006). Food choices vary from one place to another. In the United States of America, the major values in choosing foods are taste, convenience and cost (Glanz et al. 1998). In Europe, the major values are quality or freshness, price, nutritional value and family preferences, in that order (Lennernäs et al. 1997). This study showed that 63.5% of the educators agreed that nutrition knowledge affected their choice of food. According to Roberts et al. (2009), educators are the role models for learners in making healthy food choices.

In addition, nutrition knowledge is becoming increasingly important in food choice and the association between knowledge and eating behaviours shows that with nutrition knowledge, healthier eating behaviours may occur (Zarnowiecki et al. 2012). Therefore, there is an urgent need for the promotion of effective health and nutrition education interventions to implement changes in food choice, diet and lifestyle (Van Cauwenberghe et al. 2010).

The findings of the present study showed that more than three quarters of the educators read food labels before buying food, and the majority of them agreed that food labels affected their choice of food product. This finding is supported by a study conducted by Chen et al. (2010).

Nutrition education is taught in public schools in South Africa with a focus on knowledge for school performance, rather than promoting a motivation towards nurturing nutrition behaviours that are consistent with health and well-being (Kupolati et al. 2015). Thus, the potential influence of the school environment in shaping desirable nutrition attitudes and practices among learners was not realised (Lakshman et al. 2010). A lack of training and support for educators is just one of the many obstacles that educators face when implementing school wellness programmes and syllabi. In this study, more than half of the educators reported that nutrition was not part of their curriculum at their training institution. The curriculum should be explicit, and teachers should receive training in the use of the curriculum. Nutrition training for teachers that has a behavioural change component can lead to effective nutrition education, and thereby help foster healthy eating behaviours in learners (Hildebrand et al. 2012). It is not easy for the educators to teach nutrition while they do not have basic nutrition knowledge themselves.

Evidence from previous studies confirmed an improvement in the dietary behaviour of learners when classroom teachers implemented nutrition education interventions for learners (Steyn et al. 2009). From the results of this study, just over half of the educators preferred to talk about nutrition daily, while over half wanted to discuss issues related to nutrition daily. Almost half of the educators preferred to discuss dietary issues with families. Family meals can provide an opportunity for a pleasant, cooperative time where entertaining conversation and healthy food choices accompany the opportunity to develop strong parent–child relationships and family connectedness (Eisenberg et al. 2004). A study conducted by Kupolati et al. (2015) also supports how parents’ and peers’ influence has an impact on nutrition education and eating behaviour of learners.

This study revealed that the majority of the educators felt that a 10-year-old child should have three meals per day, while less than one-third of educators reported that breakfast was the most important meal for the child. Children can be irritable and have difficulty concentrating if they are hungry, which can interfere with learning. They also experience low energy, which can limit their physical activities. Many primary school children travel long distances to school with little or no breakfast at all. As feedback to the Childhood Education Services, teachers reported that there was an improvement in children’s attendance, attention, behaviour and level of concentration when healthy eating was accepted and practised (Appleby 2009).

Only one educator in this study related skipping of meals with performance; this implies that the majority of educators did not know the consequences of children skipping meals. It also raises a concern as to whether educators really understand the importance of the PSNP, which is now implemented in schools in South Africa. In this study, just over one-third of the educators stated that it was important for children to be physically active so that they could concentrate in the class. Forty per cent of the educators mentioned that children need to be physically active so that they could grow and be healthy.

Children need to be active to promote strong skeletal muscle and muscular and cardiovascular development. Children spend most of their time at school, which place the school in an excellent position to promote healthy eating. Encouragement of healthy attitudes towards physical activity and healthy nutrition behaviour interventions impacts positively children’s health by increasing physical activity and healthy eating (Breslin & Brennan 2012; Eisenmann et al. 2011; Senekal et al. 2015).

The findings of this study show that most educators understand the importance of carbohydrates, fats, fruits and vegetables, but lacked knowledge in other areas, such as the importance of water, protein and dried beans. Even though they did not know the importance of protein, they knew that it formed part of a balanced diet. Most educators mentioned that carbohydrates, fats, protein, and fruits and vegetables formed part of a balanced diet.

Only 39.5% of educators agreed that dried beans form part of a balanced diet. Few (7.0%) of them stated that atchaar formed part of a balanced diet, which was incorrect. A study conducted by Dalais and colleagues (2014) reported that only 30.5% of teachers were able to describe a well-balanced diet. Nutrition affects how children perform in school (Hays & Baghurst 2014). Not only do all children need the opportunity to have a well-balanced diet, but according to Farfan-Ramirez et al. (2011), a child with adequate nutrition has a higher ability to fully participate in school activities and can actively learn.

The present study shows that about half of the educators correctly responded that carrots are a rich source of vitamin A. Some of the educators answered correctly when they said that tomatoes are a rich source of vitamin C, while fewer than a quarter of the educators were correct when they responded that liver is a rich source of iron. Only less than one-third of educators stated that seafood is a rich source of iodine. Almost all of the educators identified fruits and vegetables as foods that are high in fibre.

According to the study conducted by Ayieko and Anyango (2011) in Kenya, the teachers did not show a basic knowledge of foods rich in vitamins A and C. A South Carolina study on nutrition knowledge, attitude and practices found overall fair nutrition knowledge among nutrition educators, with gaps in their knowledge pertaining to nutrition and the function of minerals and vitamins (Anca Codruta & Alexandra 2005). This finding supports this study’s observations where educators did not have adequate knowledge about rich sources of vitamin C and the consequences of its deficiency.

The present study revealed that the total knowledge score of the educators is poor – showing that the educators did not have sufficient nutrition knowledge. Students’ poor performance at the end of the school year is attributed to factors relating to the skill and effectiveness of the teachers (Uko-Aviomah 2005). If educators are not strong in the content knowledge and pedagogical competence so vital for effective learning, then the limits of achievements of learners will be equally weak.

The need for nutrition training for teachers was confirmed in a South African study where teachers admitted to have insufficient knowledge about nutrition and healthy dietary habits (Nguyen et al. 2017). The findings of this study are supported by studies which found that teachers had poor nutrition knowledge in Zambia (Sherman & Muehlhoff 2007), South Africa (Dalais et al. 2014; Oldewage-Theron & Napier 2011) and the United States of America (Kinsler et al. 2012). For teachers to be valuable sources of nutrition information, they must be equipped with adequate knowledge and they must be able to convey accurate nutrition information to students and respond to their questions and concerns about diet and nutrition (Chen et al. 2010).

The majority of educators in this study did not identify a nutrition topic that they could teach. Just over one-third of educators identified healthy food and lifestyle as nutrition topics. Others chose food groups, food additives, importance of fruit and vegetables, and good nutrition as nutrition topics. In the Nutrition Guide for Nutrition Education at School (Department of Basic Education 2011), there are eight nutrition topics for teachers to teach. In this study, however, the educators failed to indicate some of those topics such as healthy eating, dietary habits in children, nutrients in food, food hygiene and food processing (Department of Basic Education 2011). It could be that educators did not have confidence in teaching nutrition topics because nutrition was not part of their curriculum during their training.

This was supported by a study conducted by Lumeng et al. (2008) who reported that educators lacked confidence in teaching topics in which they did not have sufficient knowledge, while Lambert, Monroe and Wolff (2010) showed evidence that just over half of the teachers believed that they did not have adequate classroom time to include nutrition competencies.

More than half of the educators felt that nutrition education should form part of the curriculum at the primary level, while less than one-fifth of educators stated that it should start at the secondary level. According to Kyere et al. (2020), adequate time should be allocated for nutrition education throughout the preschool, primary and secondary school years as part of a sequential, comprehensive school health education programme. Teachers should be adequately trained to teach nutrition and be provided with ongoing in-service training. In addition to sufficient training, teachers need current and relevant nutrition education resources.

School gardens are emerging as health education tools in the academic setting. About 65.5% of the educators in this study reported that they had vegetable gardens in their schools and the majority of them produced spinach (74.0%), tomatoes (69.5%), carrots (69.5%), and cabbage (69.0%). This observation agrees with the findings of a study where learners followed up on gardening practice by planting new crops at their homes (Hendrie et al. 2008). The development of vegetable gardens was perceived as an important positive factor. It is argued that children became more interested in what they were able to participate in, rather than in what they were taught (Kupolati et al. 2015). Anecdotal evidence, a growing body of research-based literature supports the use of youth gardens as a beneficial teaching tool. The benefits of school gardens can be divided into four categories: academic achievement, a healthy lifestyle, environmental stewardship, and community and social development. Only education level and the institution where qualification was obtained from were determined. The content on specific nutrition in the education curriculum of the different institutions was not established.