Lessons and Activities: Sound, Listening, Soundscape Studies

Introduction:

This page contains online lesson plans and activities collected from world-wide sources. It also contains a database of lessons and activities developed by a seminar offered at the University of Oregon, summer, 2003.

These materials provide a starting point for many educators interested in teaching about sound, listening skills, and soundscape studies.

Lesson Plans: K-!2 Collection.These edited lesson plans were developed by students in a summer seminar on attentive listening and soundscape studies offered by the College of Education at the University of Oregon. Each is a first attempt at the design of an instructional activity related to sound and are offered here as initial plans for other teachers to personalize and develop.

I Love What I Hear.The activities on this web site are designed to be used by teachers with children in grades three through six. They may be adapted easily for use with older and younger students.Several are helpful in building awareness in children of the importance of hearing conservation and the problem of noise-induced hearing loss. Others may be used to introduce and reinforce scientific understanding of hearing and the science of sound. Still others are meant to provide opportunities for children to influence the awareness and understanding of others.All of the activities have been used successfully in classroom settings. Site contains a PDF booklet free for download and use by educators and others.

Sounds All Around Us. This lesson is a video-based investigation of sound and embraces the premise that students understand basic properties of solids, liquids and gases. Through instructional strategies utilizing video, hands-on activities and interactive participation, students advance existing knowledge to include understandings of how sound is created, how it travels in waves and under what conditions it travels best. An important component of the plan explores environments of the hearing impaired, allowing students to become sensitized to their special needs as they discover ways of being supportive