NARIT News

ITCA brought Teacher Training Program to Portugal

The International Training Centre in Astronomy under the auspices of UNESCO (ITCA) ventured into Europe, taking its outreach activities beyond Asia and Africa into Portugal. From September 7–11, 2026, ITCA travelled around Portugal to Nazaré, Oeiras, and Constância for the ITCA Teacher Training Program conducted in collaboration with NUCLIO-Núcleo Interactivo de Astronomia. The initiative brought together educators and astronomy enthusiasts for a series of hands-on workshops designed to explore astronomy through different perspectives.

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Throughout the week, ITCA shared a variety of activities developed to enhance astronomy education and outreach through a series of fun and engaging hands-on learning experiences. The Inclusive Astronomy workshop introduced NARIT’s tactile astronomical models and initiatives, giving Portuguese educators inspiration on how Thailand approaches astronomy education for everyone. 

“I’ve attended different conferences and workshops about astronomy, but Inclusive Astronomy is an entirely new concept for me. The work that your team does is truly inspiring.” Expressed by Bárbara Cristóvão, participant from the Agrupamento Escolas de Alter do Chão.

Participants also explored Beyond Visible Light, discovering wavelengths such as infrared and ultraviolet that lie beyond what our eyes can see. ITCA provides low-cost, hands-on activities that can explain the study of light and the electromagnetic spectrum in a simple and engaging way. The Moon Phases activity allowed participants to explore how the Moon moves across the sky, when it rises and sets, and how its position throughout the month creates the different phases we observe from Earth by replicating the movements of the Earth and Moon themselves.

“These activities are something that I can bring back to the kids I work with. I’m already thinking of ways to incorporate them into my class.” Exclaimed by Irina Joana Póvoa founder of OviScience: A Ciência da Ovelha, who also participated in one of the workshops.
Through the Powers of Ten card game, participants worked together to arrange objects from the smallest to the largest, exploring the enormous range of scales found in science and astronomy. With the shuffled cards spread out before them, the participants eagerly worked as a team, discussing and carefully putting their understanding of the universe to the test.

Alongside the ITCA workshops, NUCLIO introduced their very own set of interactive activities to the program. Among these activities was the Remote Team Mapping Task led by Gustavo Rojas where participants engaged in activities aimed to promote firsthand experience in communication, teamwork, and problem solving during space missions. Using walkie-talkies, the teams worked together to recreate a map based on the field team’s instructions, with the final reveal showing how closely the two maps matched. This activity is part of NUCLIO’s broader Analog Astronaut mission initiatives for students, which include the development of an analog mission site at the Observatório do Lago Alqueva (OLA) near Monsaraz. 

“This trip to Portugal has been quite educational,” exclaimed Matipon Tangmatitham, ITCA Director and the ITCA team leader of this workshop series. “While we have plenty of firsthand account how effective our activities can be for teachers in emerging countries in Asia and Africa, this is our first venture into Europe,” said Matipon, “We are well aware of cultural differences between the East and the West, but it’s quite remarkable to still witness how our teachers still share common struggles on some basic concepts in astronomy. This illustrates the importance of how our workshop can contribute to better education for all.”

“We’re also impressed by the amazing work done by NUCLIO at advancing educating teachers and the public around the world,” Matipon continues, “We share many common goals and together we can compliment each other with our activities. Discussions have already been made about more future collaborations in other regions around the world.”

ITCA Teacher Training Program is an on-going annual workshop series conducted by ITCA and OAE Center Thailand with the aim to provide hands-on activities aimed to promote astronomy education around the world. This workshop is endorsed by the IAU OAE Teacher Training Programme (TTP) and has been reviewed against the Astronomy Teacher Training Transparency Standards (AT3S). With the addition of Portugal, the workshop has now been conducted in over 13 countries across 3 continents, with the aim to keep expanding to other regions every year.