Identified domains from quantitative and qualitative interviews, intervention content and delivery of intervention strategies
| Identified domain | Intervention content | Strategy |
|---|---|---|
| Knowledge | The menu planning workshop will attempt to address the service managers and cooks awareness of the sector specific nutrition guidelines, the AGHE food groups and the daily recommended serves per child to be provided while in care.5 | The menu planning workshop |
| The menu planning workshop will introduce the Caring for Children resource, which outlines the sector-specific nutrition guidelines. Participating services will also be provided with menu planning tools and checklists, recipe ideas, budgeting factsheets and serve size posters during the workshop. | Printed or electronic resources | |
| Post attending the menu planning workshop services will receive two face-to-face service visits (duration 1–2 hours) with a support officer at their service on site, which will also target specific knowledge gaps regarding application of the guidelines and provide clarification about any information about the sector-specific nutrition guidelines that the service cook or manager were uncertain about. | Service visits | |
| Skills | During the menu planning workshop the service cook and service manager will be taught step by step how to plan a service menu that is compliant with the nutrition guidelines using the menu planning checklist within the Caring for Children resource. Each service will be asked to bring their current service menu to the training and as part of the workshop will review the menu items for one full day of their menu. Activities such as serve size calculations and recipe modification exercises will assist to develop the individual menu planning skills of the service cooks and service managers. In addition, small group discussions during the workshop will provide opportunities for services to share ideas, problem solve and practise menu planning processes together. | Menu planning workshop |
| The follow-up support contacts will provide additional opportunities for the service cook and manager to practice menu planning skills with their allocated support officer and receive immediate feedback and guidance to ensure menu compliance. | Follow-up support contacts | |
| Environmental context and resources | Services will be encouraged to adapt the service environment to be more supportive of the implementation of the nutrition guidelines. Services will be asked to display the nutrition guidelines and serve size posters in highly visible areas in the kitchen and to store provided resources at easily accessible areas. | Follow-up support contacts |
| Printed resources | ||
| Action planning | At the menu planning workshop, the service cook and service manager will set joint goals and action plans, using a goal setting template, to work towards menu compliance based on their completed review of one full day of the service menu. Services will be encouraged to begin developing SMART goals and indicate who is responsible to achieve each goal. A copy of the developed goals and action plans will be collected at the end of the workshop by each service's allocated support officer. | Menu planning workshop |
| During the follow-up contacts support officers will review the goals and actions plans of each service and use quality improvement principles encouraging service managers and cooks to identify problems, set new goals and implement action plans to facilitate services progression towards having a 2-week menu that is compliant with nutrition guidelines. | Follow-up contact | |
| Professional identity | The service cooks and service managers are to determine clear roles and responsibilities for the implementation of nutrition guidelines, as part of their goals and action plans, during the menu planning workshop. | Menu planning workshop |
| The MOU signed by the service cook and service manager during the initial follow-up service visit will recommend that the service manager be supportive of the implementation of the nutrition guidelines and communicate feedback directly to the service cook. | Follow-up support | |
| Service managers will be encouraged to update the service nutrition policy and the service cook position description to reflect the defined roles. | Securing executive support | |
| Beliefs about consequences (reinforcement) | The intervention will attempt to strengthen the relationship and communication between the service cook and service manager.49 The service manager will be encouraged to provide feedback to the cook throughout the intervention, as detailed in the signed MOU. Both the service manager and service cook will attend the support officer service visits, where they will together discuss the services progress towards compliance with the nutrition guidelines. | Follow-up support |
| A communication tool developed for the intervention will be provided to the services by their allocated support officer during the first follow-up contact. The communication tool is designed for the service cook and service manager to provide clear feedback about the service menu between each another and as a monitoring tool to document the steps undertaken by the respective parties. | Printed resources | |
| Social influences | The newsletters distributed throughout the study period will relay key messages, provide further meal and snack ideas for inclusion on the menu and highlight case studies from services that have made significant improvements to their service menu. Highlighting achievements of other intervention services can act as an external influencer to progress services towards having a 2-week menu that is compliant with nutrition guidelines. | Printed materials |
AGHE, Australian Guide to Healthy Eating; MOU, memorandum of understanding; SMART, specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, appropriate timeframe.