HSF Teachers Summer Workshop at ESTEC’s Erasmus centre
It was three days of listening, learning, brainstrorming and networking for forty secondary school teachers from all ESA Member States, when they participated the first ESA Human Spaceflight Teachers Workshop at ESTEC in the Netherlands last week.
Well over 200 applications were received after ESA’s Directorate of Human Spaceflight announced the first Teachers Workshop and asked interested teachers from the ESA Member States to participate. Forty were finally selected and invited to ESA’s technology centre ESTEC to take part in the three-day workshop that was held from 28 to 30 June at the Erasmus Centre in ESTEC.
“Human spaceflight education wants to continue to engage teachers in an ongoing dialogue to become more involved in the design and development of education materials that will continue to inspire the younger generation,” said Piero Messina, the Head of the Coordination Office of ESA’s Directorate of Human Spaceflight (HSF), when welcoming the teachers from the 18 ESA Member States on the first day of the workshop.
The programme, based mainly on interactive, hands-on experiences, allows teachers to learn about the education materials that have been developed by the education team of the HSF Coordination office. These include activities such as “Take your Classroom into Space”, the video “Feeding our Future – Nutrition on Earth and in Space”’, and the innovative educational game “Space flight Challenger 1”.
Meet an astronaut
ESA astronaut Frank De Winne gave the keynote lecture about the highlights of his OasISS mission and later discussed with the teachers his role with the education projects organised through the HSF education team.
De Winne did many educational activities during his long duration mission aboard the International Space Station and provided a number of ideas for similar future projects. The educational aspect of the next long duration flight on ISS by an European astronaut, Paolo Nespoli’s mission that starts in next December, will be even more important and will benefit from ideas developed during the workshop.
Teachers were also guided through brainstorming sessions and a discussion with guest speakers about the use of space topics in classroom activities.
Other workshops on Mars Exploration, radio contacts, human spaceflight in the movies and the PlayDecide game were facilitated by science communicators, experts and the teachers themselves.
The programme was completed by tours to the ESTEC High Bay and test facilities, an interactive dinner at Space Expo and a relaxed evening on the beach.
During the three days there was plenty of opportunity for teachers to share ideas with their colleagues and the ESA organisers. The general feeling during the workshop was busy, filled with knowledge and experience in a truly European context.
ESA would like to thank the teachers who took part for their enthusiasm and all the speakers who contributed to making this workshop a great and unique occasion for sharing knowledge on the benefits and importance of using Human Spaceflight as a didactical tool.