Summer SAVY, Session 4 Day 2, “The Science of Senses” (3rd-4th)
Well, today was SOUND DAY. Do you know what that means? Lots of NOISE! But good noise.
Our intro today was “Guess That Sound”, which was a simple, fun way of engaging with the students at the start of the day. The students then acted out their favorite sounds, and the class had to guess! Some of the sounds were extremely funny and sweet. Many kids acted out the sounds of parents or dogs snoring! I won’t tell who was the loudest.
I wanted the students to understand the evolutionary importance of sounds and how we are surrounded by sounds we rarely notice. We discussed sound-related questions, such as: What is the function of sound? How do we know something is dangerous? Soothing? Beautiful? What is the purpose of music? At first, I wanted students to simply stop and listen and be able to identify the sounds in the room that are usually in the background. We had several activities to include 3 minutes of “listening” and “listing” sounds in the room, then brainstorming about why sounds are important to humans. Some great examples were shared of how hearing exists for our protection, as well as pleasure, as well as communication.
Of course, no “sound day” is complete without a discussion of the anatomy of the ear canal and how the ear works. The students watched a brief video and generated their own questions: “When did scientists find out about all this hearing stuff?”, “What is earwax for?”, “What diseases harm the ears?” These are all great questions for students to research further!
Between ORA and lunch, the students completed their ear diagrams and then had a “brain break” where we listened to different selections of music and the students had to draw and give a title to the images that the music evoked. I did not tell them in advance the titles of the music. We listened to “Flight of the Bumblebee”, Gershwin’s “An American in Paris”, Copeland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man”, and selections from “Carnival of the Animals” (Saint-Saëns) and Ennio Morricone’s “Gabriel’s Oboe”. The kids were highly engaged with this activity and were able to generate images that were similar to what the composer intended. It’s always so interesting to see how music resonates with students.
After lunch, students were tasked with making musical instruments with yesterday’s “leftovers” from our sense of taste activities. We ended up with Skittles Maracas and other percussion instruments. This activity allowed students to be creative, evaluate sounds made by their instruments, and put some engineering design skills into practice!
Our big event of the day was a Zoom call with Tim Tuchrello, who is a sound editor in LA, and has worked for 32 years in the entertainment business on hundreds of films and television shows. The students’ questions were excellent. They were amazed to learn that there is a sound library containing millions of sounds and were intrigued when discussing how sound is “done” in terms of technology and working with directors. Tim is currently working on the new Percy Jackson, and other shows and films the kids know all about! Ask your child to share with you what they learned about sound production!
Tomorrow, we are on to SIGHT and lots of optical illusions! We are set for a fun day!