New unit: Sound Travels












What a lovely day to explore musical instruments outside!
The children enjoyed making music and played marching band.

Our new Unit of Inquiry entitled "Sound Travels" will focus on how sound and music are used to represent people's feelings, ideas and cultures.
Today we gathered ideas and questions related to the the following lines of inquiry:
- How sounds are created and heard
- The different forms of music across cultures.
After showing a picture of the inner ear the children became very curious about the mechanics of the different parts and how we hear sound.
Some of the questions were:
Isaak: How do you hear? Where does it travel (talking about the various parts)? Why do your ears get wet and plugged and gets wax?
Olivia: Why do your ears always listen?
Anne Why do your ears gt dirty? How do you wash your ear?

Then for the part we discussed musical instruments. The children pointed/identified pictures of instruments (from a poster) they know and then we went outside and played some. When asked how they made music with their instruments some children noticed that the shape, size and structure of the instrument can affect the way it sounds. For instance Nicky and Isaak noticed the difference between the sounds of metal and wood when they hit it. Lucas and Anne observed that there are some instruments that you blow into and some that you hit. We then identified 2 groups of instruments in our group: Wind instruments and Percussive instruments. As they played some more the children got interested with the different sounds they can make using their body parts. Isaak started pounding his fist and stomped while Anne and the others fluttered their lips to create a motor sound. Then the list of sounds kept growing they observed that cars, leaves and sand can make sound.
I think I got my work cut out for the next few weeks.

keep you posted....


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