NARIT News

SEAROAD Workshop Philippines

The International Training Centre in Astronomy under the auspices of UNESCO (ITCA) has finished its teacher training workshop in collaboration with the local host The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA). The workshop was held in Quezon city, at the PAGASA headquarters between 20-21 January 2026.

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This particular workshop had witnessed record-breaking applications with over 800 applicants from all over the Philippines after only 24 hours of announcement, forcing the local host to close the registration ahead of the planned deadline. Due to space limitation, only 64 of the applicants were able to participate.

This workshop was yet another of the ITCA teacher training workshop series aimed at equipping astronomy and science educators in Southeast Asia with relevant and hands-on activities that suit well with the local classroom culture. With over 10 unique hands-on workshops and classroom activities developed by ITCA. Topics include basics to stargazing, exploring the universe beyond what our eyes can see, moon phases, exploring the scales of the universe via powers of ten card game, solar system planet walk, making a comet, lunar cratering lab, constellation maker, and understanding the rotation of the celestial sphere. In addition, the local host contributed workshops on using telescopes, basic astronomy flipchart by PAGASA, and a tour to the night sky via PAGASA planetarium.

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At ITCA, we focus on developing tools to help transitioning from traditional lecture-based classroom style by offering new and engaging alternatives developed fully with local classroom cultures and customs in mind. As a result, the feedback from the teachers in the Philippines workshop was overwhelmingly positive as participants found the activities to be engaging, highly relevant, and relatively low cost to implement with the resources available locally.

The workshop concluded with a unique public lecture held at the rooftop of PAGASA Astronomical Observatory that was attended by the local general public. The event finished off as the sky temporarily cleared up for the participants to be able to view Saturn and Jupiter via a telescope operated by PAGASA.

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ITCA is dedicated to help other nations with our annual ITCA/SEAROAD workshops and we are always seeking new local partners for our next teacher training workshops. Contact us for more information if you would like to be the next potential local host.