Butterfly Body Bright: because every child deserves to feel bright in their body.
Butterfly Body Bright is a strength-based, evidence-informed body image program developed by Butterfly Foundation.
Designed to be integrated into Australian primary schools, it provides resources and support to teachers and their broader school community. The program aims to promote healthy attitudes and behaviours towards the body, eating and physical activity in children, so they can thrive at school and in life.
It takes a village to raise a child! Butterfly Body Bright takes a whole school approach to supporting positive body image in children.
Why is Butterfly Body Bright important?
Negative body image starts young, with studies reporting body dissatisfaction being experienced by approximately 50% of
pre-adolescent girls and, increasingly, pre-adolescent boys.
Body dissatisfaction can contribute to negative physical and mental health, and poor social outcomes, as well as being a significant risk factor to the development of disordered eating and eating disorders.
Butterfly Body Bright can help primary schools - their families and communities – to foster a positive foundation during childhood for:
body satisfaction
healthy eating
physical activity
Butterfly Body Bright aims to empower Australian children to be:
How can we get involved?
I’m an educator and would like to be a Body Bright School!
Register your school to receive:
School culture guidelines to build a positive body image community.
Online staff training about body image in children and effective program implementation.
Lesson plans (Foundation-Year 6) for each of the Body Bright themes, aligned to curriculum.
Information and resources to share with your families.
I’m a parent and I’d like my child’s school to be a Body Bright School!
We’d love for you to become a Body Bright advocate and share information about the program with your child’s primary school via their class teacher, the decision makers or your school’s parent association.
Primary schools are the ideal setting to lay the foundation for positive attitudes and behaviours towards the body, eating and physical activity. Butterfly Body Bright can help!
I’m a parent/guardian and I’d like our family to be Body Bright!
Families and the home environment play a significant role in helping children to foster healthy and positive attitudes towards the body, eating, and physical activity.
Body Bright provides information and resources for families of primary school aged children.
If you are a family with teens, check out Butterfly’s Body Kind Families (12+)
What the research says.
Read about the research that informed Butterfly Body Bright and the outcomes from our evaluation.
Praise for Butterfly Body Bright.
“It made me feel grateful for my body and everything around me.”
— Year 4 student (VIC)
“Don’t feel as though body image was spoken enough/at all throughout my primary school years. If this was an open topic, I may have been more aware of what I was feeling and how it also can affect others.”
— Vicky, 22 (NSW)
“I love that this program really explores concepts that are so important. I don't think that teachers in the past have had time to really explore these concepts well, they are often glossed over. To create a program that is so easy to read and follow is a credit to Butterfly Foundation.”
— Maree, Teacher (WA)
Further questions about Butterfly Body Bright?
We’re here to help!
Butterfly Body Bright has been independently reviewed and is listed in the Be You Programs Directory. It meets the minimum evidence requirements set by Be You and has been awarded a rating for evidence and implementation.
Butterfly National Helpline.
The Butterfly National Helpline provides free and confidential support, Australia-wide, to anyone experiencing body image or eating concerns. 8am-Midnight (AEST), 7 days a week.
Contact the Butterfly National Helpline to talk through your concerns about a child, or anyone in your school community, by phone (1800 ED HOPE), webchat or email. www.butterflynationalhelpline.org.au
If it is a medical emergency, please contact 000.
Butterfly acknowledges the traditional owners and custodians of the land on which we work as first people of this country.
We commit to embracing diversity and eliminating discrimination in health care. We welcome all help-seekers and strive to create a safe place for all people, irrespective of their size, shape, age, abilities, gender, sexuality, cultural background, language, economic status, profession or location.