Learning health promotion from skateboarders: A community-based practice to rethink the academy teaching method

Abstract

The complexity imposed by the translation of the health promotion theory into practice has set a challenge to be overcome by universities during the teaching-learning process. Motivated by the "open the university's gates to the community" movement, this chapter reports a community-based practice based on the students' experience with a group of skateboarders to discuss health promotion practices in the city. The report emphasizes how skateboarders are mobilized to face the challenges imposed by urban aggressiveness through their socialization networks. From developing a participatory action study using the Photovoice method, skateboarders produced a photographic survey and reflective narratives about relationships in the urbanization process that allowed students to connect with health promotion theories.