Goalball na educação física escolar: compreensões a partir do desenvolvimento de uma unidade didática

Abstract

The inclusion of Paralympic modalities as topics in school Physical Education fosters the development of a critical pedagogical practice capable of challenging deficit-based assumptions about disability and reorganizing conditions of participation through relationships built within the collective. In this context, Goalball, a sport created specifically for people with visual impairment, holds strong pedagogical potential, as it promotes embodied experiences that engage auditory and spatial perception, communication, and cooperation among students. This study aimed to develop and analyze a Goalball teaching unit, seeking to understand the learning processes constructed by 7th-grade students in a public school in Araraquara, São Paulo, Brazil. This qualitative study was designed as a pedagogical intervention and consisted of twelve 50-minute lessons. Data were produced through field notes, and analysis was conducted using coding and categorization procedures. Learning outcomes were organized into five categories: (1) initial conceptions and the reframing of visual impairment; (2) the embodied experience of disability: fear, insecurity, and adaptation; (3) communication, cooperation, and the collective organization of the game; (4) student agency, authorship, and autonomy in constructing practice; and (5) reflection, expression, and the synthesis of learning. The results indicated a reframing of stereotyped conceptions, the development of bodily and sensory strategies, the centrality of cooperative relationships, and the strengthening of reflective processes regarding the practice. It is concluded that Goalball, when approached as pedagogical content within school Physical Education, constitutes a powerful practice for fostering bodily, relational, and reflective learning, contributing to a broader understanding of inclusion as a collective process grounded in pedagogical conditions and in the relationships established within the school context.