Health promotion curriculum may seen as a figure or description of the model of world, which aims to facilitate students’ and school community’s empowerment, support health learning facilities and enhance cultural change. Thus, the aim in planning of curriculum in health promoting schools is to integrate health promotion as a part of schools’ education in teaching and learning and in other activities. There are available conceptualized models of curriculum, theoretically argued goal taxonomies and philosophic-theoretical approaches such as behaviourist, cognitive, humanistic-constructive and culture-humanistic, which form a frame and basis on curriculum planning and development. In behaviourist approach health learning proceeds according to gradual changes when learning goals are described in several measurable sub-goals. The well known goal taxonomy based on behaviourism is divided in cognitive, affective and psychomotor domain including hierarchical stages describing behaviour and teaching content that occurs usually in classroom settings. Cognitive approach emphasizes a student’s health thinking, understanding and knowledge processing. The learning goals are focused on knowledgeable facilities, acquiring knowledge and development of critical thinking. A student in humanistic-constructive approach chooses health information which is based on activating of earlier knowledge constructions and forms new ones. Learning is derived from student’s health needs and interests. Teacher’s role is to facilitate student’s social responsibility, reciprocal support and wake up the student’s knowledgeable conflicts. Cultural-humanistic approach emphasis a student’s health growth and development towards future, and surrounding environment is viewed as broad wholeness where a child lives and acts. Through reflection it is possible to direct collaborative learning towards health goals and deeper understanding and health values. Curriculum is situational bounded and continually developed. The cultural-humanistic goal taxonomy is consisted of fife stages (exposure, participation, identification, internalisation and dissemination) in which learning proceeds logically and naturally towards deeper experiences.
The aim of this study is 1) to conceptualize how the subject of health education is described in the Finnish core curriculum of basic education, and 2) to investigate how health education is viewed based in local health education curricula.
The context in which the curricula are examined, include the four philosophic-theoretical approaches (behaviourist, cognitive, humanistic-constructive and culture-humanistic).

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