Brain Day 2013: My experience as the Coordinator

I'm honoured to have been the coordinator of this year's Brain Day, a program that's part of Parachute Canada. Parachute is a national, charitable organization with a strong aim of reducing injuries that are preventable. 

Brain Day is an event where university students visit elementary schools and teach about injury prevention, the brain, and the 5 senses through interactive activities. As the coordinator, I recruited elementary schools and volunteers for the event during UBC's Reading Week. This year, we visited Waverley Elementary, General Wolfe Elementary, and Kerrisdale Elementary. We devote a day at the school where we do the presentation and activities with classes for ~2hours. We delivered Brain Day to a total of 12 classes, which is double the number of last year classes!

Brain Jello

I was a presenter last year and it was an extremely fun and great experience at Carnarvon Elementary and Kerrisdale Elementary. I really enjoyed working with the kids and teaching them science. It's really amazing to see them shoot up their hands when we ask for volunteers. One of the activities allows the students to touch the brain jello and it's so amazing to see them get excited over it. 

Students touching the brain jello
Photo credit: Maki

Students touching the brain jello that I made
Photo credit: Maki

If you are interested in participating as a class or would like more information, please send an email to braindaybc@gmail.com

If you're an university student interested in teaching, talking about neurology, or simply want to join the fun, please send an email to the above e-mail address as well. If you are hesitating, don't! At first, I was intimidated to stand in front of a class of students and talk about neurology. What if they ask me a question and I don't have an answer? What if I can't control the class? An afternoon training session will be held where I'm able to answer all your 'what ifs'.

Water fountains at an elementary school

I remembered water fountains being really big... but they looked amazingly small today and were placed at the height of my knees (well, above them). So tiny! Going to elementary schools really brought back my childhood memories, especially since we visited my elementary school. I would like to thank all the schools, teachers, and students who participated in this program. I really hope that the students took away the essential information regarding the importance of their brain and that they had much fun as we did. I'm also grateful to have recruited an enthusiastic group of volunteers and would like to thank them for wonderful work!
Cheers to a successful Brain Day week!