Abstract:

Bearing in mind the concept of Education advocated by UNESCO for the 21st century, of Education for all and throughout life, Social Education has a preponderant role in the process of human development, especially for the most fragile and vulnerable people. Hippotherapy is a method of therapeutic intervention, which uses the horse in an interdisciplinary perspective of riding, education and health, providing the global development of people with disabilities, disabilities and mental illness. The social educator, endowed with a specific nature, through socio-educational intervention and concrete actions of social solidarity in the promotion of human dignity, combined with hippotherapy, aims at the autonomy of the person, fostering the empowerment of all throughout their life, enhancing the subjective and civic training, in the construction of inclusive life projects. The general objective of this study is to understand how hipotherapy promotes the empowerment of the person in a holistic way, in the socio-educational context. The research question that guides the study is: How are social educators and hippotherapy interrelated socio-educationally?

The study was carried out in the North of Portugal, with a sample of 5 social educators and 4 hypotherapists. It is of a qualitative nature with the design of grounded theory. Data collection was carried out through a semi-structured interview. In order to take into account ethical issues and maintain the confidentiality of the studied context, as well as the anonymity of the participants, the interviews were identified by ES1 to ES5 (those of social educators) and by EH1 to EH4 (those of hypotherapists). It was requested in writing, and giving the information on the purpose of the study, the interviewees' consent to audio record the interviews, which was carried out by the researchers and authors of the study. The data triangulation was carried out through the two types of respondents (Social Educators and Hypotherapists), as well as with the literature, with the support of the webQDA software.

The main results of the study are:
i) Hipotherapy is a therapeutic modality that uses the horse in the scope of an interdisciplinary approach, in the areas of health and education, with the objective of biopsychosocial development.
ii) The way the child's / adult's body interacts with the animal contributes to the development of muscle strength, relaxation, body awareness, balance and subsequent motor coordination.
iii) The interaction with the horse also promotes socialization, self-confidence and self-esteem.

In the context of social education, we can conclude that the nature of hippotherapy, and here, social educators and hypotherapists are interconnected, there is a whole organizational process of information coming from abroad, which is absorbed by the person and treated, enabling and encouraging him to ability to produce adaptive responses to the environment in which it is inserted. Basically, hippotherapy is nothing more than a type of intervention that combines the pedagogical and therapeutic valences in order to improve the individual's most fragile domains and areas, in the image of the social education intervention in the socio-educational context.

Keywords:

Social education, Hippotherapy, Socio-educational, webQDA.