Let us know how we can help.

One of our core goals is to inspire our tamariki/rangatahi. Below are a few ways we plan to help support our locals schools. We’re also open to ideas, feel free to get in touch.

School Visits: If you would like our team to visit your school to talk to you about medical imaging research and about our journey contact us at: j.lepper@matai.org.nz

Come and see us at the A&P Show, where we will have a range of fun hands on activities around the brain and heart for all ages, including a giant inflatable walk-through brain, and we’ll have experts there to answer questions from kids or parents.

We’ll also have representatives from Being Brainy and the NZ Brain Bee Challenge at the show, who can help with any information you need on these activities.

We’ve put together a few basic fun facts about MRI for kids. Find out what MRI is and how it works.

Mātai is sponsoring the new House of Science Magnetic Madness kit to help our tamariki understand the basics of the technology behind what we do. MRI allows us to see inside the human body, by creating pictures using a big magnet. This can help us understand how our brain and body work, and to look at injuries or disease.

Magnetic Madness Kit

Do opposites attract? Students experiment to explore the properties of magnets, magnetic fields, how compasses work, and the phenomenon of magnetism. Students discover magnetic poles and how magnetism can be used to manipulate metal items. They discover that different materials respond differently to magnets, and temporary magnetism is demonstrated. Students make a compass, and as an extension, discuss cardinal and ordinal points. Using compasses as magnetic field detection devices, the magnetic lines of force around a bar magnet are mapped.

Contact tairawhiti@houseofscience.nz to book the kit or for more details.

The New Zealand Brain Bee Challenge (NZBBC) is a competition for high school students in year 11 to learn about the brain and its functions,  neuroscience research, and spark their interest in STEM and careers in neuroscience. This is a great opportunity for high school students  to get experience interacting with enthusiastic University faculty and potentially to visit Auckland for round two of the competition. Teachers can enrol Y10 students for the challenge in November for the 1st round of the competition in March. The competition is run through the website “Education Perfect”. If the school does not have an Education Perfect licence There is a cost of $16/month  per student.

Mātai will help support a limited number of students who are keen to take part in the challenge by helping cover the costs involved if they or the school are unable to do so. We could potentially also organize tutoring for a limited number of students.

Contact us for further details.