Seeing Sounds
Grades K, 1, 2 | Science, Music, Arts Education, ELA, ADST
Grades K, 1, 2 | Science, Music, Arts Education, ELA, ADST
Embedded Files
Learners investigate how sound can be represented visually by observing the sound waves created by different instruments and noises. Through listening, predicting, observing, and drawing, students explore how changes in volume, pitch, and tone affect what sound waves look like.
The project gives learners an opportunity to make and record scientific observations while building curiosity about how the sounds they hear can be captured and represented using technology.
Read our newsletter post: Vol. 116 🎷 Seeing Sounds
How it supports the curriculum
How it supports the curriculum
Big Ideas
Big Ideas
Science: Light and sound can be produced and their properties can be changed.
Content Connections
Content Connections
Science: Natural and artificial sources of sound. Properties of sound and how they depend on their source and the objects with which they interact. Pitch, tone, and volume. Ways of making, recording, and transmitting sound.
Arts Education: Students listen for and describe differences in sounds produced by a variety of instruments, particularly changes in pitch, tone, and volume.
Curricular Competencies
Curricular Competencies
ADST:
Questioning & Predicting: Demonstrate curiosity and a sense of wonder about the world. Observe objects and events in familiar contexts.Make simple predictions about familiar objects and events.
Planning & Conducting: Make and record observations.
Processing & Analyzing: Compare observations with predictions through discussion. Identify simple patterns and connections.
Evaluating: Compare observations with those of others.
Communicating: Communicate observations and ideas using oral or written language, drawing, or role-play.
Classroom Things Needed
Classroom Things Needed
Technology: Teacher iPad or Mac, Projector, Student iPads
Services: Background Noise App, Twisted Wave, Seesaw
Materials: Variety of Instruments
Teacher Skills needed
Teacher Skills needed
👉 Note: We can help build your confidence with all of these skills before and during the project!
Twisted Wave: Record live audio and display it on projector for students to observe.
Seesaw: Support students with uploading their worksheet and recording a reflection.
Student Skills needed
Student Skills needed
👉 Note: Just like the teacher skills, we can help build students' confidence with all of these skills before and during the project!
Seesaw: Sign in, take photos, record response, submit assignment.
Project Outline
Duration: 2 hours
Project Outline
Duration: 2 hours
Phase 1: Exploring Sound
Phase 1: Exploring Sound
Launch Activity: Students reinforce the difference between natural and artificial sounds through a virtual sound walk, followed by a physical sound walk around the school. Students listen carefully, identify sounds around them, and compare and categorize their observations.
Phase 2: Recording Observations
Phase 2: Recording Observations
Students observe the sound waves produced by different instruments and draw the patterns they see on a Sound Wave Observation Worksheet. Sounds are intentionally changed in volume, pitch, and tone, allowing students to compare and record differences between the waveforms.
Phase 3: Drawing Sound Through Listening
Phase 3: Drawing Sound Through Listening
Students listen to music or live instruments without seeing the waveform and draw lines that respond to what they hear. They consider how their drawings might change as the sound becomes louder, quieter, higher, lower, faster, or slower.
Oh, that's what a saxaphone sound looks like!
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