The significance of health promotion practices in childhood: a study of daily school life through drawing

Abstract The scope of this paper was to describe the health promotion practices developed in a community school in the municipality of Rio de Janeiro in the light of public policies and the school culture. It sought to analyze the significance attributed by the students to these practices and discuss the model of care and health promotion practices developed at school, based on the meanings attributed to such practices by the subjects under study. The qualitative and ethnographic approach supported by Geertz facilitated an understanding of the significance emerging around the health issue. The results demonstrated the incorporation of health promotion actions in daily school life, their interface with sectorial policies, and the central importance of these actions in normative aspects. The significance reproduced medical-sanitary clichés portraying the social spaces, the material resources, the procedures involved and the social actors in these actions. The influence of local culture, habits and lifestyles in the construction of the concept of health in the community studied is highlighted.