There are six lessons this month (Lessons 31-36) on sound. Students
build a sound wave detector, construct and test a cup-and-string sound
carrier, and create string, percussion and wind instruments for a class
orchestra. They are given opportunities to work as a member of a group
and independently.
At the end of these lessons is the third quarter assessment. It should
be used after the six lessons for this month are completed.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 31 - Sound
Sound identification test and homework assignment adapted from Sound
and Music by Kay Davies and Wendy Oldfield
Objectives
Identify and list some sounds around them.
Create a poem describing sounds they like and those they do not like.
List some examples of onomatopoeia and create a class poem of onomatopoeic
words.
Identify objects by the sounds they make when shaken in a container.
Materials
A tape recorder, if available
A 2 pint milk carton or plastic
butter tub containing a handful of pennies
For each group of five students: A crayon or marker and three 2
pint milk cartons or plastic butter tubs each containing a handful of everyday
items. One container might contain paper clips, another buttons, the third
small pencil erasers. Each container is sealed with tape and has a masking
tape label on it.
Suggested Books
Berger, Melvin. All About Sound. New York: Scholastic, 1994.
Davies, Kay and Wendy Oldfield. Sound and Music. Austin, TX:
Steck-Vaughn, 1992. Contains lively illustratons, color photos and simple
activities for this age group.
DiFiori, Lawrence. What is Sound? New York: Parents Magazine
Press, 1973.
Jennings, Terry. Making Sounds. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990. Excellent description of how movement causes sound. Includes information
on how sound waves move through solids, liquids as well as air.
Teacher Note
To save time, write the poem template on the board before the lesson.
Procedure
Ask the students to take out paper and pencil. Tell them you'd like
to find out how well they listen. Have the students close their eyes, listen
carefully to the sounds around them for a minute, then open their eyes
and write down at least three sounds they have heard. Have the students
share the sounds and list them on the board. Point out that by listening
carefully, they identified these sounds even though, most of the time,
they probably would not notice them because there are so many sounds around
them.
Share with the students a sound you like and a sound you do not like.
For example, you may like the sound of rain on an umbrella, but not like
the sound of screeching brakes. Have the students create their own poems
using the template below:
I like the sound of _______________________________,
the sound of _____________________________,
and of __________________________________.
But I do not like it when I hear the sound of _____________________________.
After some writing time, have a few students share their poems with
the class. Ask the students to, with their voices, imitate the sounds they
have talked about in their poems. For instance, creak for a squeaky
door or chirp for a bird. Write the word onomatopoeia (AHN-oh-mot-oh-PEA-uh)
on the board. Tell the students that onomatopoeia is the formation
of a word that imitates a sound. Point out that tweet and bang
are onomatopoeic words. Ask the students to help you list some other
onomatopoeic words. The list might include thump, ding-dong,
beep, whoosh, crunch, cuckoo, atchoo, meow,
cluck, bow-wow, growl and vroom. Have the students
create a noisy onomatopoeic poem: go around the room and have each child
say an onomatopoeic word. They may think of new ones or use words from
the list. If there is a tape recorder available, record the poem and then
play it back for the students to hear.
Remind the students that when they listed sounds they heard at the
beginning of the lesson, they identified what made those sounds. For instance,
the honk they heard was a car horn or the slam was a classroom door closing.
Shake a container of pennies. Ask: Do you think this container is full
of feathers? (no) Of soup? (no) Of sand? (no) How can you tell? (by the
sound it makes) Shake the container again and ask the students to tell
you something about the contents of the container. They might identify
the sound of metal jingling, identify the contents as solid and not liquid
and even identify the contents as pennies or coins. Show the students the
contents of the container.
Tell the students that they are going to divide into groups to participate
in another sound identification test. Divide the class into groups of five
students each. Distribute the containers to each group and tell the students
that inside each sealed container are everyday items. The items in each
container are all of one kind--no mixes. They cannot see the items, but
will try to identify them using their ears. Distribute the containers to
each group. Tell the students, when they think they know what is inside
a container, to write the name of the items on the masking tape label.
When groups have finished labeling the containers, have each one come up,
show the labels to the class and then open the sealed containers to verify
the contents. Keep a tally on the board of successful and unsuccessful
identifications for each kind of item. Ask: Which item was hardest to identify
by sound? Which was the easiest?
Tell the students that next lesson they will learn about sound waves
and make a sound wave detector.
Possible Homework
Have the students take a few minutes at home to listen carefully to
the sounds around them and then make a list. Ask them to use their lists
to make charts of the sounds they heard, classifying them under three headings:
machines, living things, other sounds.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 32 - Sound
Objectives
Build a sound wave detector.
Demonstrate that sounds are vibrations.
Draw a diagram showing a way to prove that vibrations travel out from
a sound maker in all directions.
Materials
Blindfold
Two pieces of cardboard at least 8 2
inches by 11 inches
Rubberband stretched over an empty tissue box
A dozen dominoes
A balloon
For each group of five students: coffee can, 1/4 teaspoon of salt,
plastic wrap, rubber band, empty milk carton or jug, pencil or ruler, sound
detector worksheet (attached)
Suggested Books
Ardley, Neil. The Science Book of Sound. New York: Gulliver,
1991.
________. Sound Waves to Music. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990. Includes illustrations of a sound wave detector and sections on directing
sound and how vocal cords produce sounds.
Davies, Kay and Wendy Oldfield. Sound and Music. Austin, TX:
Steck-Vaughn, 1992.
Kettelkamp, Larry. The Magic of Sound. New York: Morrow, 1982.
Parsons, Alexandra. Make It Work: Sound. New York: Thomson Learning,
1992. Includes pictures of sound wave detectors and of how to play
a sound direction game.
Peacock, Graham. Sound. New York: Thomson Learning, 1993.
Teacher Note
Be sure when blindfolding the volunteer that the blindfold does not
cover his or her ears. The cardboard sound catchers can be cut into the
shapes of large ears. A row of dominoes can be set up before the lesson
begins to save time. Diagrams can be drawn on the back of the worksheet.
Procedure
Remind the students that last lesson they listened carefully and used
their sense of hearing to identify different sounds. Ask: By listening
carefully, can you also tell where a sound is coming from? (yes) Ask the
students to help you test the sound locating skills of a volunteer. Tell
them they must be very quiet so the volunteer will be able to focus on
the location of a certain sound. Blindfold the volunteer and have him or
her stand in the middle of the classroom. Tell the students that when you
point to a student, that student should drum lightly on the desk or snap
his or her fingers. Ask the volunteer to then point to the source of the
sound. After five or six trials, tell the volunteer to listen carefully
because you are going to have a student very softly whisper a name twice.
You are going to ask the volunteer to point to the direction of the whisper
and tell what name he or she heard. After a few of these trials, ask the
volunteer: Is it more difficult to locate the whispers than the snaps and
drumming? (yes) Tell the volunteer that you are going to give him or her
a pair of sound catchers to help locate the whispers. Place a piece of
cardboard behind each of the volunteers' ears and hold them in place.
Try the whisper trial again. Ask the volunteer: Is it easier to hear and
locate whispers with the sound catchers? (yes) Remove the volunteer's blindfold
and show him or her the sound catchers. Have a few students come up, try
out the sound catchers and report on their effectiveness. Ask: What do
you think the sound catchers do? Why do you think they work? (They catch
sounds and funnel them into our ears.)
Ask: Can we see sound? (no) What do you think sound is? (Accept all
answers.) Tell the students that a sound is movement. Ask the students
to put their fingers gently on their throats and hum a tune. Ask: Can you
feel something quivering or vibrating in there? Tell the students that
their sound makers--their vocal cords--are in their throats. Write vocal
cords on the board. Tell them that when they talk or shout or sing
or hum, their vocal cords move back in forth quickly; they vibrate. Stretch
a rubber band over a tissue box and have students pluck the rubber band.
Ask: What is the rubber band doing? (It is vibrating and making a noise.)
Tell the students that like the rubber band, their vocal cords vibrate
and make the air around them vibrate or move, too. The movement creates
a wave--a sound wave--that travels to our ears so we hear sound.
Show the students the row of dominoes. Ask: If I push on one domino
and make it fall down, what will happen to the next domino and the next
and the next? (They will be pushed over, too.) Demonstrate by pushing on
the first domino in the row. Ask the students to imagine that the dominoes
are tiny particles of air. When the vocal cords vibrate they cause the
air particles next to them to move. Those particles move the particles
next to them and so on creating a sound wave. Set a few dominoes up and
demonstrate again how movement at one end creates a wave.
Blow up a balloon and stretch the neck of the balloon as the air escapes
to produce a sound. Ask: What do you think is happening to the rubber in
the neck of the balloon as the air rushes out? (It is vibrating and making
noise.) Point out that their vocal cords, the rubber band and the neck
of the balloon all vibrate. They make the air around them vibrate creating
waves of vibration called sound waves. Point out that sound waves travel
away from a vibrating object in all directions. Ask the students to imagine
dropping a pebble into a puddle and watching the ripples it makes. Draw
a dot on the board and concentric circles around it. Tell them that when
an object vibrates, the sound waves move away from the object like ripples
in a puddle. Tell them that one way to prove this is with a sound wave
detector. Divide the class into groups of five students each and distribute
worksheets and materials for making a sound wave detector.
When the groups have finished, allow one of the groups to arrange the
sound detectors according to their diagram and try to prove that vibrations
(or sound waves) move out in all directions from a vibrating object.
How To Build A Sound Wave Detector
Materials:
Empty coffee can
Piece of plastic wrap
Rubber band
1/4 teaspoon salt
Empty carton or jug
Pencil or ruler
Directions:
1. Stretch plastic wrap across the top of the empty coffee can.
2. Secure the plastic wrap with a rubber band. Make sure the plastic
wrap is stretched tight.
3. Sprinkle salt on the plastic wrap.
4. Stand close to the sound wave detector. Bang on the empty carton
or jug a few times with a pencil or ruler to make sound vibrations.
5. Watch the grains of salt closely.
Describe what happens to the grains of salt when you make noise close to the sound wave detector.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Why do you think the salt grains act this way when you make noise near the detector?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Remember that sound waves are waves of vibration that
travel out from a sound maker in all directions like ripples in a puddle.
If you had as many sound wave detectors as you wanted, how could you prove
this? On the back of this page, draw a diagram of what you would do.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 33 - Sound
Objectives
Demonstrate that sound waves move through solids.
Construct and test a cup-and-string sound carrier (telephone).
Describe what the world might be like without telephones.
Materials
Plastic ruler
Tuning fork and clear glass bowl of water
A pin
For each pair of students: two paper cups, 4 to 6-ft length of heavy
thread or string, two paper clips, a pencil
Suggested Books
Ardley, Neil. Sound Waves to Music. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990. Includes an explanation of why there is silence in space as well
as illustrations of how a telephone works.
Broekel, Ray. Sound Experiments. Chicago: Childrens Press, 1983.
Gregoire, Tanya. Museum of Science Activities for Kids. Holbrook,
MA: Adams Media, 1996. Contains a well-written description of a call to
the pizza shop and how sound waves travels from the vibrations of vocal
cords to telephone receiver where sound waves are changed into electrical
signals that travel down a phone wire and to the other phone where they
enter the ear piece and are translated back into sound waves and heard
by the pizza man. In addition to instructions for making a string telephone,
this book contains a section on other things to try such as experimenting
with a four-way telephone and with different types of string and containers.
Jennings, Terry. Making Sounds. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990. Includes good illustrations of the pin dropping demonstration and
string telephone.
Scott, John. What is Sound? New York: Parents' Magazine Press,
1973. Contains a clear explanation of the workings of a string telephone
on pages 13-15.
Teacher Note
To save class time, you may want to draw the cup-and-string sound carrier
diagram on the board before the lesson. Tell the students that a pencil
point is a good way to make a small hole in the bottom of the cup for the
string. If they tie a paper clip to the end of the string, it will not
slip out of the hole.
Procedure
Remind the students about the domino demonstration in the last lesson.
Ask them to describe what happened when you pushed over the first domino.
Remind the students that when an object vibrates, it moves air particles
around it. Those air particles bump into the ones around them and, just
like the dominoes, a wave is created--a sound wave. Place a plastic ruler
flat on a desk with most of it overhanging the edge. Hold it down to the
desk with one hand and, with the other hand, snap the ruler so it vibrates
against the desk. Ask the students to look carefully at the ruler when
you snap it to see it vibrate. Ask: What do you think happens to the tiny
particles of air around the ruler when I snap it? (The particles of air
around it vibrate and bump into other particles creating a sound wave.)
Ask: Can you see the air around the ruler vibrate? Snap the ruler and have
the students observe that the vibrating air is invisible.
Show the students the bowl of water. Ask: Do you think sound waves
can travel through water the same way they travel through air? (Accept
all answers.) Show the students the tuning fork and demonstrate how it
makes a sound. Hit the tines of the tuning fork against the heel of your
hand. Circulate through the classroom and allow students to listen to the
vibrations of the tuning fork. Ask students to describe the sound the tuning
fork makes. Point out that the vibrations are moving through air. Strike
the tuning fork and let the tines touch the surface of the water in the
bowl. Ask: What do you see? (ripples) Point out that in a liquid, they
can see evidence of vibration waves, the ripples. Ask students if they
have ever heard sounds underwater. Perhaps they have put their ears underwater
in the bathtub or dove underwater in a swimming pool. Ask them to describe
the quality of sounds heard underwater. Tell the students that just as
air particles are set in motion by a vibrating object, liquid particles
are, too. So sound waves do move through liquids. Sounds travel through
liquids about four times as fast as they do through air.
Ask: Do you think sound waves can travel through a solid such as the
wood of a desk? (Accept all answers.) Have two volunteers come to the front
of the room and stand on either end of a desk or table. Ask: Have you ever
heard people say, "It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop?" Show the
students a pin and have one of the volunteers drop the pin on the desk.
Ask the other volunteer if he or she heard the sound of the pin drop. Have
that volunteer put his or her ear flat on the desk and have the other volunteer
drop the pin again. Ask the listening volunteer: Was the sound of a pin
dropping different when your ear was on the desk and you were hearing it
through the wood? (The sound was louder or easier to hear through wood.)
Point out that in solids, particles are packed closer together than they
are in liquids or gases such as air. When there are vibrations, even ones
as small as the ones from a pin dropping, particles that are more crowded
together bump into each other more than they do in liquids or air. So sound
vibrations actually travel better through many solids. They travel best
through metals.
Say: Here is a tricky question. Native Americans who hunted buffalo
on the Great Plains were sometimes seen putting their ears to the ground.
Knowing what you do about how sound travels through solids, what do you
think they were doing? (listening for the sounds of buffalo) Point out
that the ground carried the vibrations from the hooves of the buffalo herd
to the hunters farther than the air could carry them.
Show the students a piece of thread. Ask: Do you think a piece of thread
or string can carry sound vibrations? (Accept all answers.) Draw a picture
on the board of how to construct a cup-and-string voice carrier. Be sure
to show in the diagram that the string should be taut. Give each pair of
students a piece of thread, two paper cups and two paper clips to make
and test their own voice carriers. When the students are finished, ask
what they concluded from their tests: Can a piece of thread carry sound
vibrations? (yes) Point out by using the diagram that talking into the
paper cup made the bottom of the cup vibrate. Those vibrations caused the
string attached to the bottom of the cup to vibrate. The vibrating string
made the bottom of the other cup vibrate so the partner heard what was
being said.
Ask: What might be another name for a cup-and-string voice carrier?
(telephone) Point out that the telephone they made is a very simple one.
Ask: What happened when the string was not pulled tight? (Sound did not
travel through the string.) Why do you think the string had to be tight
for the telephone to work? (The string would not vibrate when it was loose.)
Tell the students that more than 100 years ago there were no telephones.
Ask: What
would the world be like if we had no telephones? (Accept all answers
and list them on the board.) Students might point out that without telephones,
they could not keep in touch with relatives and friends outside the neighborhood.
They could not order pizza. People in offices and businesses would have
to write letters to communicate with other business people. It would take
much more time for newspapers and news shows to find out what is happening
in other parts of the world. People couldn't call a taxi or the doctor.
There wouldn't be call in radio shows.
Tell the students that thanks to a man named Alexander Graham Bell
who invented the telephone, today people can talk to friends living on
the other side of the world or right down the street. Tell them that next
lesson they will hear more about Alexander Graham Bell and his invention.
They will also find out the first words said over a telephone.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 34 - Sound
Objectives
Describe why there is no sound in space.
Classify some sounds according to their volume.
Arrange a series of water-filled glasses according to their pitches
and indentify which glass is vibrating the fastest.
Materials
Masking tape, six cards or labels describing sounds of various volumes
(see Teacher Note)
Four identical clear drinking glasses filled to different levels with
water, a spoon
Picture of Alexander Graham Bell from Suggested Books
Suggested Books
Ardley, Neil. Sound Waves to Music. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990. Contains a volume chart showing decibel levels of sounds from too
soft to hear to painful.
Beech, Linda Ward. Magic School Bus in the Haunted Museum: A Book
about Sound. New York: Scholastic, 1995. Includes an illustration
of Mrs. Frizzle singing high notes and low notes visually showing the frequency
of the sound waves.
Broekel, Ray. Sound Experiments. Chicago: Childrens Press, 1983.
On page 32 there is an good explanation of pitch or frequency and an
experiment that involves blowing across the mouths of bottles to produce
sounds of different pitches or frequencies.
Dunn, Andrew. Alexander Graham Bell. New York: Bookwright, 1991.
Fisher, Leonard Everett. Alexander Graham Bell. New York: Atheneum,
1998. At this writing, Fisher's book is yet to be published but promises
to be as excellent as the other highly regarded books by this award-winning
author.
Lewis, Cynthia Copeland. Hello, Alexander Graham Bell Speaking.
Minneapolis: Dillon, 1991.
Parker, Steve. Alexander Graham Bell and the Telephone. New
York: Chelsea, 1995.
Quackenbush, Robert. Ahoy! Ahoy! Are You There? A Story of Alexander
Graham Bell. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1981.
St. George, Judith. Dear Dr. Bell--Your Friend, Helen Keller.
New York: Putnam, 1992. While for more advanced readers, this book offers
a different perspective on Bell and focuses on his work with the deaf.
Helen Keller dedicated her autobiography to him.
Teacher Note
Labels for the volume line might include: lion's roar, snow falling,
breeze blowing, whispers, clock ticking, thunder, lawn mower, jack hammer,
brakes screeching, yelling, exposion, rocket launch, siren or alarm, lawnmower,
car horn, crunching leaves underfoot, tapping on the door, glass breaking,
birds singing, a pin drop, pages turning, a sneeze.
Procedure
Remind the students that they learned in a previous lesson about light
(Lesson 25 - Vision and Optics) that light travels 186,000 miles per second.
Ask: Do you think that sound travels at the same speed as light does? (No,
nothing is faster than the speed of light.) Tell the students that sound
travels much slower than the speed of light. Sound travels at 1,000 feet
per second. Point out that we can observe this when a thunderstorm is approaching.
We may see a flash of lightning and then several seconds later hear a boom
of thunder. It takes longer for the sound to
reach us than for the light flash. Another example of how much faster
light is than sound: At a baseball game we may see the batter swing the
bat and a split second later, hear the crack of the ball hitting the bat.
The sound takes longer to reach us than the light bouncing off the batter.
Say: Light travels through space. We know because we can see the light
of distant stars. Here is very, very tricky question. Does sound travel
through space? Remember that a vibrating object moves particles around
it to make sound waves, but there are no particles of air in space. There
are no particles to vibrate and make sound waves. Imagine you are far above
the Earth floating in your space suit outside the Space Shuttle. Suddenly
a rocket zooms past you. Do you hear a sound? (no) Why not? (because the
rocket does not vibrate any particles to make sound waves) There are no
sounds in space. Point out that sounds of explosions in space movies such
as "Star Wars" are fake. If people were watching an explosion in space,
they would not hear any sound. Tell the students that an explosion in space
has zero volume.
Tell the students that the volume of a sound is its loudness
or softness. Ask them if they have ever seen a button or knob on a T.V.,
radio or tape player labeled volume. Ask: What happens to the sound
when you turn up the volume? (It gets loud.) Write volume on the
board and under it a line with soft sounds-low volume at
one end and loud sounds-high volume at the other end. Point out
that there are many sounds with volumes in between loud and soft. Ask the
students to help you place some sounds on the volume line. Have students
come up and tape the labels describing different sounds along the volume
line where they think the sounds belong. Point out that they have arranged
a variety of sounds according to volume.
Tell the students that another way we can describe a sound is by its
pitch. Write pitch on the board. Ask the students to sing
a high note with you. Now have them sing a low note. Tell them that the
first note has a high pitch. To make the high note their vocal cords had
to vibrate fast. To make the low note they had to vibrate more slowly.
Sounds that have a high pitch, such as a whistle, a squeal, a bird chirping,
are made by something vibrating fast. Sounds that have a low pitch, such
as the rumble of a truck engine, the boom of a bass drum or a dog growling,
are made by something vibrating more slowly.
Show the students four glasses, each containing a different amount
of water. Tap on a few glasses with a spoon and ask: Do you hear sounds
of different pitches? (yes) Since all the glasses are the same, why do
you think they make sounds of different pitches? (different amounts of
water) Ask: Do you think you could arrange these glasses in pitch order,
from lowest pitch to highest pitch, without tapping them but just by looking
at them? Have a volunteer come up and arrange the glasses in pitch order.
Have another volunteer verify the order by tapping on each glass with the
spoon in sequence. Ask: Are they in pitch order? Point out that the first
volunteer arranged the glasses according to the amount of water in them.
Demonstrate that the glass with the least amount of water produces a sound
of the highest pitch. The glass containing the most water produces a sound
of the lowest pitch. Ask: Knowing what you do about pitch and vibrations,
which glass is vibrating faster? (The one with the least amount of water.)
Which glass is vibrating the slowest? (The one containing the most water.)
Ask the students to name two qualities of sound (volume and pitch)
Ask: Can a sound have a high volume and a low pitch? (yes) Ask the students
to name a sound that has a high volume and a low pitch. An answer might
be a thunderclap. Ask them to name a sound that has a low volume and a
high pitch. An answer might be a far-away train whistle or a mosquito buzzing.
Ask: What happens as you move away from a sound maker? Does the volume
get higher or lower? (lower) Why do you think that happens? (The soundwaves
have to travel
farther. The sound loses volume.)
Remind the students that last lesson they made cup-and-string telephones
and talked about what the world would be like without telephones. Remind
them that today they are going to learn about the very first telephone
call. Remind them that Alexander Graham Bell was the man who invented the
telephone. Show the students a picture of Alexander Graham Bell from Suggested
Books. Tell the students that Alexander (his family called him Aleck) was
born in Scotland. From a very early age, Aleck was interested in sound
and how we speak. On a trip to London once with his father, he saw a demonstration
of a speaking machine. He decided he wanted to make a speaking machine,
too. He and his brother built a model of a mouth, throat, nose, tongue
and lungs. They pumped air from the model lungs through the vocal cords
in the throat and moved the tongue and mouth so that the speaking machine
made humanlike sounds. From what he learned, Aleck was able to move the
mouth and vocal cords of his pet dog so that the dog would growl words!
Aleck wanted to read everything he could about talking, hearing and
sound. He even tried to read books in other languages. One book was by
a German scientist. Aleck misunderstood what he read. He thought
the scientist had written that there might be a way to send voices through
a wire. "What an interesting idea," Aleck thought. "To use electricity
to send voice sounds over a wire!" He started experimenting to see if he
could do it.
When his two brothers died of an illness and Aleck became sick, his
parents moved with him to Canada. When he recovered from his illness, Aleck
moved to Boston and began teaching at a school for the deaf. He also continued
his work on sending a voice over a wire. By a lucky chance, Aleck met Thomas
Watson who worked at a electrical machine shop. Thomas Watson was very
good at making things and Aleck was full of ideas. Together they figured
out how to change sound vibrations from a voice into electrical signals
that could travel quickly through a wire. The wire could carry the signals
into an earpiece or receiver where they could be changed back into sound
waves that a person could hear. One day, when they were working on their
invention, Thomas Watson was in one room and Aleck was working in another,
Aleck spilled acid and called out. "Mr. Watson, please come here. I want
you." Watson heard Alexander Graham Bell's voice coming through the receiver
he was working on. This was the very first telephone call.
Tell the students that Alexander Graham Bell went on to invent other
devices including a metal detecting device to find bullets in a person's
body, a vacuum jacket to give artificial respiration, a giant kite that
could carry a person, and hydrofoils--super-powered boats. His most important
invention, however, was the telephone.
Possible Homework
Tell the students that they can be inventors, too. Have them describe
in a paragraph, draw a diagram of, or build a model of an invention that
will make their voice sound louder (increase its volume).
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 35 - Sound
Objectives
Identify differences in pitch and volume of sounds.
Create string, percussion and wind instruments for a class orchestra.
Demonstrate how pitch and volume can be altered using the created instruments.
Materials
A large bottle, a pitcher of water, a pencil
For each member of the drum group: two balloons, scissors, a tin can
with both ends removed and no sharp edges, two rubber bands, a wooden dowel
or stick, how-to sheet (attached)
For each member of the guitar group: a shoebox or other sturdy cardboard
box, scissors, six rubber bands, a wedge-shaped piece of corrogated cardboard
to use as a bridge, how-to sheet (attached)
For each member of the maracas group: two paper cups, handful of lentils
or beans, masking tape, how-to sheet (attached)
For each member of the pan pipes group; 8 drinking straws, masking
tape, scissors, how-to sheet (attached)
For each member of the slide whistle group: a length of narrow diameter
pipe, a wooden dowel cut 6" longer than the pipe and slightly smaller in
diameter so it can slide inside the pipe, how-to sheet (attached)
A tape recorder
Suggested Books
Ardley, Neil. Sound Waves to Music. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990.
Berger, Melvin. All About Sound. New York: Scholastic, 1994.
Davies, Kay and Wendy Oldfield. Sound and Music. Austin, TX:
Steck-Vaughn, 1992.
Gregoire, Tanya. Museum of Science Activities for Kids. Holbrook,
MA: Adams Media, 1996. The section "Noisy Fun" includes instructions for
making string telephones, pitch pipes, sonic ears and musical instruments.
Parsons, Alexandra. Make It Work: Sound. New York: Thomson Learning,
1992. Although some of the projects in this book are a bit sophisticated
for third graders, the instrument-making projects are inspired.
Teacher Note
By giving each group the means to make variations on the same instrument
(larger and smaller cans, cups, rubber bands, boxes, pipes) differences
in pitch can be observed. Most hardware stores carry copper and brass pipe
in narrow diameters as well as plastic pipe. Wooden dowels also come in
varying diameters. Remember that dowels should be about 6" longer than
the pipe into which they are to fit. The dowel should be as wide as possible,
while still sliding easily in the pipe. Many hardware stores will cut the
pipe and dowels to your specifications. Be sure that rubber bands
are large enough to fit around boxes and cans and that balloons are large
enough to fit the largest cans used such as coffee cans. Extra lengths
of dowel can be used as drum sticks. Cans used to make drums should have
the tops and bottoms removed. Flatten sharp edges with pliers, if necessary.
Procedure
Remind the students that last lesson they learned about qualities of
sound. Ask: What are two qualities of sound? (volume/loudness and softness,
and pitch) Show the students a large empty bottle. Blow across the top
of the bottle to produce a sound. Ask: Since you know that sound is caused
by vibrations, what do you think is vibrating to make a sound when I blow
across the bottle? (The air inside the bottle is vibrating.) Ask: Is the
sound a high-pitched or low-pitched sound? (low) Since it is a low-pitched
sound, is the air vibrating fast or more slowly? (more slowly) Pour some
water into the bottle and blow across the top of the bottle again to make
a sound. Ask: How has the pitch of the sound changed? (It is a higher pitch.)
Add some more water to the bottle and again blow across the top to make
a sound. Ask: How has the pitch of the sound changed now? (It is higher
than the first or second sound.) Point out that as you add water to the
bottle, you are making the air space inside the bottle smaller. The air
particles have less room and are vibrating faster. Ask: What happens to
the pitch of a sound when particles vibrate faster? (The faster they vibrate,
the higher the pitch of the sound.) Point out again that you made the pitch
of the sound higher by adding water and reducing the amount of air space
in the bottle.
With a pencil, tap gently on the desk. Ask: Is this sound low volume
or high volume? (low) Strike the pencil hard on the desk. Ask: How has
the volume of the sound changed? (The volume has increased or gone up.)
What caused the volume to go up? (You hit the pencil harder on the desk.)
Point out that you needed to put more effort into a louder sound. Tell
the students that you would like them to very quietly sing a note with
you. The note will have low volume. As you raise your hand higher, you
would like them to increase the volume of the note, but not the pitch.
Try this exercise a few times. Ask: How did you increase the volume of
the note? (pushed more air out while singing the note) Point out that they
put more effort into a louder sound.
Tell the students that you would like them to demonstrate how to make
changes in pitch and volume by creating a class orchestra. For this orchestra,
they will make their own instruments.
Write string, wind and percussion on the board.
Tell the students that these are the sections of the class orchestra. The
names describe what is vibrating and producing sound. Point out that in
the string sections, it is strings that vibrate to make sound. Ask: What
are the names of some string instruments? (guitar, violin, stand-up bass,
harp) Point out that in wind instruments it is air that is vibrating to
make sound. Ask: What are the names of some wind instruments? (flute, clarinet,
bassoon--trumpet, trombone and saxophone are part of the brass section
of the orchestra but are also air-vibrating instruments) Tell the students
that percussion means to hit or strike an object sharply. In percussion
instruments, the vibrations are caused by hitting something such as the
head of a drum and causing it to vibrate. Ask: What are the names of some
other percussion instruments? (maracas, cymbals, bass drum, xylophone)
Divide the class into groups--three groups making wind instruments, one
group making string instruments, and two groups making percussion instruments.
Distribute the materials and how-to sheets to each group. Point out that
the sheets offer basic suggestions, but if students have other ideas for
the design of their instruments using the available materials, they should
pursue them.
When the students have completed their projects, have each group demonstrate
its instruments. Ask members of the orchestra sections to demonstrate how
they can change the pitch and the volume of sounds their instruments make.
Ask: When you blow into the pipes or into the slide whistle, what happens
to the air inside the instrument? (It vibrates.) What happens when you
vibrate air in a shorter pipe? What happens to the pitch? (It goes up.)
Ask the string section members: When you pluck the strings of your instruments,
how can you raise the pitch of a note? (by stretching a rubber band tighter
or by plucking a thinner rubber band "string") If students do not demonstrate
this themselves, point out that one can shorten a string by pressing it
against the body of the instrument and then plucking it to produce a higher
pitched note. Point out that rubber bands and vocal cords vibrate faster
when they are pulled tighter. Ask string section members: What happens
to pitch when vibrations are faster? (The pitch of a sound goes up when
vibrations are faster.) Ask percussion section members: How can you increase
the volume of the sounds you make with percussion instruments? (Hit the
drum harder./Shake the maracas harder.) Did you discover that all the drums
make sounds of the same pitch? (no) What do you think changes the pitch
of a drum? (size of the drum head, how tight the drum head is stretched)
Ask: Are all the maracas the same pitch? (no) Why do you think they are
different? (sizes of the maraca shells are different/more space inside,
less space inside)
Tell the students that you would like to make a class orchestra recording.
Arrange wind, percussion and string sections. Tell the students that you
would like to record three orchestral pieces: the first will be a marching
piece, the kind of music one can march to. The second will be a dancing
piece. The third will be a piece of music meant to put a baby to sleep,
a lullaby. While recording, have the students play their instruments--first
percussion to establish rhythm, then adding string section and then wind
section. Let the musicians listen to their class orchestra recording.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 35 - Sound
To Make Pan Pipes
Materials:
drinking straws
scissors
tape
Directions:
1. Use the scissors to cut straws in different lengths.
2. Lay the straws side-by-side on a table and
tape them together.
3. Pick the pan pipes up and blow gently across
the top of each straw to make a sound.
___________________________________________________
To Make a Slide Whistle
Materials:
A length of metal pipe
A wooden dowel
Directions:
1. Pick a wooden dowel that is almost the same width
as the pipe.
2. Slide the dowel into the pipe.
3. Blow gently across the top of the pipe.
4. Move the dowel up and down the pipe while
blowing to change the pitch of the sound.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 35 - Sound
To Make a Drum
Materials:
Tin can with both ends removed.
Two balloons
Two rubber bands
Scissors
Stick
Directions:
1. Cut off the necks of two balloons.
2. Stretch a balloon tight over the end of a can.
Have a group member help secure it with a rubber band.
3. Stretch a balloon over the other end of the can.
Have a group member help secure it with
a rubber band, too.
4. Use your finger tips or a stick to play the drum.
___________________________________________________
To Make Maracas
Materials:
Two paper cups
Handful of lentils or beans
Tape
Directions:
1. Choose two paper cups of the same size.
2. Put a handful of lentils or beans into one of the
cups.
3. Turn the other cup upside down and
tape the two cups together, rim to rim.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 35 - Sound
To Make a Guitar
Materials:
A box
Six rubberbands
A piece of cardboard
Scissors
Directions:
1. Cut a large hole in the lid of a box.
2. Stretch six rubber bands around the box. Make sure
the rubber bands are not touching each other
and that they pass over the sound hole.
3. Use a piece of cardboard as a bridge to lift the
rubber bands away from the box just above the sound hole.
4. Pluck the rubber bands where they pass over the hole.
Pluck them one at a time or strum them.
__________________________________________________________________
To Make Jug Pipes
Materials:
Plastic soda bottles of various sizes
Masking tape
Directions:
1. Choose two soda bottles of different sizes.
2. Place the bottles side by side and tape them together.
3. Blow across the top of one bottle and then two times
quickly over the other bottle to make an "um-pa-pa" sound.
Third Grade - Science - Lesson 36 - Sound
Sound catcher project adapted from "Sonic Ears" in Tanya Gregoire's
Museum of Science Activities for Kids.
Objectives
Design and test sound catchers.
Demonstrate a word in sign language.
Identify the parts of the ear.
Materials
Diagram of parts of the ear for transparency (attached)
For each pair of students: paper or plastic cups, egg cartons, paper,
scissors, yarn, masking tape, a safety pin or bobby pin
Picture of sign language for transparency (attached)
Parts of the ear worksheet (attached)
Suggested Books
Bender, Lionel. Science Through the Microscope. New York: Alladin,
1995. On page 83 there is an illustration of the inside of the ear and
a microscopy photo of the inside of the cochlea.
Billingslea, Kathie and Victoria Crenson. Hearing. Mahwah, NJ:
Troll, 1988. Includes sections on how ears hear, how to take care
of your hearing and "Do I hear when I am asleep?"
Gregoire, Tanya. Museum of Science Activities for Kids. Holbrook,
MA: Adams Media, 1996. Markle, Sandra. Outside and Inside You. New
York: Bradbury, 1991. On pages 16 and 17 is a photo of the inside
of the ear and of the middle ear bones--the anvil, hammer and stirrup.
Mathers, Doug. Ears. Mahwah, NJ: Troll, 1992.
Parker, Steve. Brain Surgery for Beginners and Other Major Operations
for Minors. Brookfield, CT: Millbrook, 1995.
Royston, Angela. The Human Body and How It Works. New York:
Random House, 1990.
Rustean, Jean. The Human Body. New York: Dorling Kindersley,
1993. Discusses how the ear works as well as the part the semi-circular
canal plays in balance.
Showers, Paul. Ears Are for Hearing. New York: HarperCollins,
1990.
Walpole, Brenda. Hearing. Austin, TX: Steck-Vaughn, 1996.
Procedure
Remind the students that they have been learning about how sound is
made and how it travels. Tell them that in this lesson they will learn
how sound is heard. Show the students the transparency of parts of the
ear. Point out that sound waves enter the ear canal and travel to
the ear drum. Tell the students that the ear drum is a piece of
skin about the size of a fingernail on one of their pinky fingers. It is
stretched across the inner ear of the ear canal just like a drum head.
Remind the students how jumping salt grains on their sound wave detectors
showed that sound vibrations were causing the plastic wrap to vibrate.
Tell them that sound waves make the ear drum vibrate, too. The vibrations
of the ear drum are picked up by tiny bones in the inner ear. These bones
are the tiniest bones in the human body. The vibrating bones send vibrations
to a coiled-up tube called the cochlea. The cochlea is filled with
liquid. Point out the cochlea on the transparency. Tell the students that
when the liquid inside starts to shake, it wiggles tiny hairs inside the
cochlea. The hairs are connected to nerves that send signals to a big nerve
called the auditory nerve. Point out the auditory nerve on the transparency.
Tell the students that the auditory nerve then sends messages to the hearing
section of the brain so we can recognize sounds. Point out again that sound
is vibrations. Sound waves vibrate the ear drum which vibrates the ear
bones which vibrate the liquid inside the cochlea which vibrates the hairs
in the cochlea which are connected to nerves that send messages to the
auditory nerve and on to the brain.
Remind the students that Alexander Graham Bell, when he invented the
telephone, found a way to change voice vibrations into electrical signals
that could be sent along a wire. Point out that inside the cochlea the
same thing happens--vibrations of wiggling hairs are changed into electrical
signals that travel along nerves to the brain.
Have the students cup their hands behind their ears. Ask: Do sounds
seem louder when you cup your hands behind your ears? (yes) Why do you
think that is so? (because hands catch sound waves and funnel them into
the ear) Point out to the students that the outsides of their ears are
shaped to catch sound waves and funnel the sounds into the inside of the
ear. Remind the students that in a previous lesson (Lesson 32) you showed
them how sound catchers can help them hear and locate whispers. Tell them
that you would like them to design and make sound catchers that will help
them hear a low volume sound--the sound of a pin dropping. Divide the students
into pairs and distribute materials for making low-volume sound catchers.
Tell the students to test their sound catchers by listening for a pin drop
with and without the sound catchers. Do the sound catchers work? Remind
the students that in order to test the sound catchers, they must maintain
a very, very low volume of noise in the classroom. When the students have
finished, have pairs who think their sound catchers are the most effective,
display them to the class and discuss why they think they are effective.
Remind the students that Alexander Graham Bell taught at a school for
deaf people. Ask: What does deaf mean? (unable to hear) Point out that
sometimes parts of the ear, such as the tiny ear bones or the hairs and
nerves inside the cochlea, are damaged and a person has trouble hearing
or cannot hear at all. Deaf people may not be able to hear sounds with
their ears, but they feel the vibrations of loud sounds the same way you
do. When a truck goes rumbling past or a drummer plays loudly, we can feel
the sound vibrations in the ground or the floor with our feet. Deaf people
can enjoy music just through its vibrations.
Ask: How do you think people who cannot hear can understand what other
people say? (They can read lips.) Point out that by watching very closely
how a person is moving his or her tongue and lips, you can tell what sounds
he or she is making. Have three volunteers come to the front of the class.
Give each volunteer a sentence on a slip of paper such as, Give me the
book, Please sit down or What is your name? Tell the
students that each volunteer is going to read a sentence without making
a sound. They should watch very closely how the readers move lips and tongue
and try to determine what each is saying. Write students' lip reading guesses
on the board and then have the reader say the sentence out loud. Point
out that another way deaf people talk to each other is through sign language.
Show the students the transparency of hand signs for the word baby.
Point out that each letter of a word may have a hand sign. Have the students
spell out B-A-B-Y with you. Point out that in sign language sometimes whole
words can be represented by a gesture. Ask: How could you show the idea
of baby? Have some students demonstrate. Ask: How could you use
your hands to say, I want to go for a walk? How could you use your
hands to say You are my friend?
Possible Homework
Distribute the worksheet (attached) and have students label the parts
of the ear.
Tell the students that there is a famous question that great thinkers
have tried to answer.
The question is: If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one
there to hear it, does it make a sound? Say: Knowing what you do about
sound, vibrations and hearing, write an answer to this question and explain
your answer.
word bank
Ear Bones
Eardrum
Ear Canal
Cochlea
Auditory Nerve
Bibliography
Ardley, Neil. The Science Book of Sound. New York: Gulliver,
1991. (0-152-00579-X)
________. Sound Waves to Music. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990. (0-531-17236-8)
Beech, Linda Ward. Magic School Bus in the Haunted Museum: A Book
about Sound. New York: Scholastic, 1995. (0-590-48412-5)
Bender, Lionel. Science Through the Microscope. New York: Alladin,
1995. (1-573-35143-1)
Berger, Melvin. All About Sound. New York: Scholastic, 1994.
(0-590-46760-3)
Billingslea, Kathie and Victoria Crenson. Hearing. Mahwah, NJ:
Troll, 1988. (0-816-71006-6)
Broekel, Ray. Sound Experiments. Chicago: Childrens Press, 1983.
(0-516-01686-5)
Davies, Kay and Wendy Oldfield. Sound and Music. Austin, TX:
Steck-Vaughn, 1992. (0-811-43003-0)
DiFiori, Lawrence. What is Sound? New York: Parents Magazine
Press, 1973. (0-819-30626-6)
Dunn, Andrew. Alexander Graham Bell. New York: Bookwright, 1991.
(0-531-18418-8)
Fisher, Leonard Everett. Alexander Graham Bell. New York: Atheneum,
1998. (0-689-81607-3)
Gardner, Robert. Experimenting with Sound. New York: Franklin
Watts, 1991, (0-531-12503-3)
Gregoire, Tanya. Museum of Science Activities for Kids. Holbrook,
MA: Adams Media, 1996.(1-558-50633-0)
Jennings, Terry. Making Sounds. New York: Gloucester Press,
1990. (0-531-17212-0)
Kettelkamp, Larry. The Magic of Sound. New York: Morrow, 1982.
(0-688-01493-3)
Lewis, Cynthia Copeland. Hello, Alexander Graham Bell Speaking.
Minneapolis: Dillon, 1991. (0-875-18461-8)
Markle, Sandra. Outside and Inside You. New York: Bradbury,
1991. (0-027-62311-4)
Mathers, Doug. Ears. Mahwah, NJ: Troll, 1992. (0-816-72092-4)
Parker, Steve. Alexander Graham Bell and the Telephone. New
York: Chelsea, 1995.(0-791-03004-0)
________. Brain Surgery for Beginners and Other Major Operations
for Minors. Brookfield, CT: Millbrook, 1995. (1-562-94604-8)
Parsons, Alexandra. Make It Work: Sound. New York: Thomson Learning,
1992.(1-568-47471-7)
Peacock, Graham. Sound. New York: Thomson Learning, 1993. (1-568-47074-6)
Quackenbush, Robert. Ahoy! Ahoy! Are You There? A Story of Alexander
Graham Bell. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1981. (0-130-20776-4)
Royston, Angela. The Human Body and How It Works. New York:
Random House, 1990. (0-679-80860-4)
Rustean, Jean. The Human Body. New York: Dorling Kindersley,
1993. (1-564-58249-3)
Scott, John. What is Sound? New York: Parents' Magazine Press,
1973. (0-819-30626-6)
Showers, Paul. Ears Are for Hearing. New York: HarperCollins,
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St. George, Judith. Dear Dr. Bell--Your Friend, Helen Keller.
New York: Putnam, 1992. (0-399-22337-1)
Walpole, Brenda. Hearing. Austin, TX: Steck-Vaughn, 1996. (0-817-24217-1)
Teacher Reference
Stein, Sara. The Body Book. New York: Workman Publishing, 1992.
(0-89480-805-2)