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INVENTIONS AND INNOVATIONS
Lesson Ideas and Activities
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INVENTIONS AND INNOVATIONS
Use these lessons to explore a range of inventions and innovations through time.
KIWI INVENTIONS
Information cards about Kiwi inventions and innovations in the MOTAT classroom.
COMMUNICATIONS
A suite of lessons for students to learn about a wide range of communication in Aotearoa New Zealand.
HANGARAU: TECHNOLOGY
Discover the tools and resources used by early Māori for growing and storing food, hunting, and cultural activities.
MYSTERY OBJECTS
Take our quiz and learn about various objects that were once part of daily life.
How did people do things without electricity or running water in their homes? Find out by playing our 'old vs new' memory match games.
MYSTERY OBJECTS
Take our quiz and learn about strange looking objects that were once part of daily life.
Challenge your class to this Kahoot quiz about some of the inventions and innovations they saw in the MOTAT classroom. Who has the best memory?
LIFE HACK
Out Life Hack lessons take students through the design thinking process so they can be the innovators of tomorrow.
CURIOUS CONTRAPTIONS
Students design and test a whacky machine to be able to complete a particular task.
RUBBER BAND CARS
A fun way for students to practice prototyping, making and testing a rubber band powered car.
PAPER PLANES
A fun way for students to practice prototyping and testing by making and testing a paper plane.
Inventions and Innovations kupu
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Activity
Kiwi innovation - Pepi Pod:
History of the Pēpi pod and discussion of how it makes co-sleeping with babies safer.
Rat trapping innovation:
Story of a rat-trapping innovation. This rat-trapping compost bin was inspired by rats visiting the compost bin.
Enviromate 1000:
Kiwi designed ‘smart bait station’, innovative solutions for a predator-free 2050.
Poditrap:
New Zealand designed trapping technology: Poditrap. Learn about the design thinking process undertaken by engineer Pouri Rakete-Stones to design and manufacture a new kind of predator trap.
Predator-Free 2050 goal and the solutions-based Cacophony Project:
Discussing the challenges of the Predator-Free 2050 goal and the solutions-based Cacophony Project. This project incorporates innovative technologies, and ‘out of the box’ thinking to help restore our dawn chorus.
MOTAT's online collection: Inventions and innovations:
From idea, to prototype to product. Explore objects which reflect how innovation creates technological change in everyday objects.
Auckland at the movies: The magic of cinema:
Take a trip back through time to learn about the evolution of cinema and TV in New Zealand.
Flexo - Flexible lego:
What is Flexo? It's the world's only flexible brick system! Bounce, flex, bend, wrap or wear – the choices are seemingly endless. Flexo uses a unique rigid construction brick and flexible tendon that allows you to truly flex your imagination and create designs you never thought possible.
Lego Dress ‘Soaring over Canterbury’:
This stunning dress was crafted from LEGO® and Flexo by ‘LEGO® Masters NZ’ contestant and Museum Conservator Emily Fryer.
Dean Kamen - Inventor of the Segway:
Visionary inventor Dean Kamen has barely taken a day off since inventing the Segway, working on a number of out-of-the-box inventions that may affect the lives of billions of people around the world.
11 Kid Inventors Break Down Their Greatest Inventions:
Students between the ages of six and twelve offer sage advice at the National Invention Convention on solving real-world problems, big and small.
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