LAUSR

BACKGROUND The French social security system has initiated a nutritional education program in nursery schools. On the basis of empirical data and a nursery school model compelling the application of specific standards, we analyze the conditions under which the program is implemented. METHODS A socio-ethnographic study was conducted during the 2012-2017 period in 16 classrooms in 6 nursery schools that implemented the nutritional program. This article presents the results of a monographic analysis drawn from data collected through interviews and the observation of nutritional sessions at school. RESULTS The pedagogical tools and the rationalization of tasks involving teachers and dietitians furthered adaptation to the constraints of nursery school functioning in accordance with the dietitians' vision of the school. With the teachers' feedback in mind, the nutritional program is called upon to evolve, but its evolution will not stand in the way of program rationalization and uniformization. Teachers will nevertheless implement the program in different ways, according to the realities of their classrooms. CONCLUSION We studied and analyzed the conditions favorable to collaboration between nursery schools and the French social security system. Results showed how the "sanitarization" of nursery schools requires anticipation of the constraints imposed by the nursery school model. Conditions for organizing collaborative work necessitated both transformation of the health program and satisfactory coordination at school between the protagonists, thereby highlighting reciprocal influence and adjustment between two (dietitians and teachers) work cultures.