The International Astronomical Union (IAU) created the Office of Astronomy for Education (OAE) to leverage the unique appeal of astronomy in fostering interest in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education. The Italian Center of the OAE, operated by the National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF), plays a key role in this global initiative. It focuses especially on building collaborative networks among educators and institutions in the Mediterranean region and on the promotion of learner-centered educational approaches. Since its inception, the Italian OAE Center has championed a co-design philosophy for the development of educational activities, aimed at engaging diverse international communities. This approach prioritises bottom-up collaboration involving IAU-endorsed educators from various countries and contexts. One of our recent initiatives is FRESCO, a co-design project focused on creating playful (PL) and game-based learning (GBL) activities for children aged 12 and under. The initiative brought together educators from ten countries across different regions, i.e. Lebanon, Morocco, Greece, Portugal, Nigeria, Syria, Pakistan, Turkey, India, and Egypt. The project aimed not only to produce educational resources but to serve as a model of participatory development, enabling educators to design meaningful activities collaboratively. In the first online phase of the project, rather than simply refining existing proposals, the group opted to take inspiration from those and design new ones from scratch. We divided into subgroups, one working on designing original board games and the other developing connected activities in a playful educational path. The teams met regularly via video conferences for several months; after the online design phase, all participants gathered for a four-day in-person workshop in Istanbul, an intensive session focused on finalizing the prototypes of the co-designed games and activities. The physical proximity allowed for deeper collaboration, quicker iterations, and more spontaneous decision-making. It also strengthened interpersonal bonds within the group, contributing to the emergence of a more cohesive community. The event was strategically co-located with the Mediterranean Regional SHAW-IAU Workshop on Astronomy for Education (MASTED), which enabled an additional testing of the prototype activities and feedback collection involving approximately 35 astronomy educators from the Mediterranean region. After the Istanbul workshop, the participants reconvened online to integrate the feedback received during the MASTED workshop and to continue improving the resources.

In this talk, the evaluation of the co-design process will be presented, with particular reference to its impact on participants and the dynamics of international collaboration. We used a diverse set of data collection tools, in particular: Pre/Post Surveys (online questionnaires distributed throughout the project, including both fixed and open-ended questions assessing participants’ comfort, confidence, engagement, and their perceptions of the co-design process over time); online session Observations and Recordings; and a Focus Group (in-person).

Our experience suggests that this co-design approach leads not only to more contextually relevant and pedagogically sound activities but also cultivates long-term, empowering professional connections.

Keywords: Astronomy education, co-design, learner-centered education.