Use of narrative in continuing health education: Educational directions, successes and limits

Abstract

The aim of this article was to discuss the educational directions, successes and limits of narratives produced in a training course for tutors and facilitators within continuing health education. Conceptual landmarks: Temporality, experience, hermeneutics-dialectics and active methodologies. This study took a qualitative approach and was based on the narrative method. It used 20 reflective texts and sought the meanings attributed to events, relationships and practices. Results: The course participant group was the central character. In terms of scenarios, the ideas were explored more as spaces for construction of subjective experiences. The plots not only followed the chronological order of the course meetings but also formed groupings of experiences according to core meanings. Conclusion: The narratives, as innovative educational tools within health education, deepened autonomy and self-determination. They led the subjects to be “authors” of their own lives and were as intense and transformative as “experiences of the self”.