Curated OER
Investigating Brass Instruments and Pitch
Students observe the sounds of different brass instruments in order to understand how to create different pitches. In this musical lesson, students create a "brass" instrument from everyday household objects. The students discuss the...
Curated OER
Rubber Band Banza
Third graders review ideas about sound and vibration to make their own stringed instrument. They review what a pictograph and bar graph are. Pupils conduct a survey within the classroom to choose the four favorite string instruments and...
Curated OER
The Physics of Sound: How We Produce Sounds
Students are introduced to how they produce sounds. In groups, they participate in experiments in which they measure sound and identify their five senses. Individually, they make their own musical instruments using different objects and...
Cornell University
Sound Waves
How does sound travel through different mediums? Scholars explore this question by creating and observing sound waves as they learn the difference between transverse and longitudinal wave motion. Using their new knowledge, class members...
Curated OER
Woodwind Instruments and Pitch
Students explore musical pitch. In this cross curriculum musical instruments and "sound" physics lesson, students identify and describe common traits of woodwind instruments. Students research "pitch" and what causes pitch fluctuation by...
Curated OER
Sound/Pitch
Students explore how pitch changes when using instruments that are plucked, blown, and hit. In this sound and pitch lesson, students blow across the top of bottles that are filled with water to create sound. Students use recorders...
Curated OER
Sound Energy
Sixth graders understand properties and behavior of heat, light, and sound. They describe the production of sound in terms of vibration of objects that create vibrations in other materials. Students describe how sound is made from...
Curated OER
From Vibration to Sound
Students observe a series of demonstrations to illustrate wave movement. For this sound wave lesson, students witness how objects create waves when dropped in a dish of water, use a rope and slinky to produce transverse and longitudinal...
Curated OER
Sounds Like Science- Bottle Organ
Learners investigate the relationship between pitches and notes. In this musical pitches and notes lesson plan, students use different sized bottles, water, and sugar to demonstrate different sounds. Learners create musical notes.
Hawaiʻi State Department of Education
Instruments from Various Cultures
After a review of orchestral instruments and instrument families, learners make their own. They listen to the song "Simple Gifts" and identify the instruments heard in the piece. Then they draw an instrument of their own invention,...
Curated OER
Designing Musical Instruments
Young scholars examine musical instruments as main part of the study of sound energy. In this designing instruments lesson plan, students focus on the elements of an instrument that cause sound to be created and design a unique musical...
Curated OER
Energy Transfer in Musical Instruments
Students create unique sounds using different instruments. In this energy lesson, students read and define several vocabulary terms such as heat, energy transfer and thermal equilibrium. Students utilize several household objects to...
Curated OER
Sounds Like Music
Students define and examine the connections between sound and music and how engineers design instruments. They listen to examples of musical instruments, view a demonstration of a tuning fork and bottles filled with varying amounts of...
Curated OER
String Instruments and Pitch
Students make predictions and explore how pitch is altered in string instruments. In this acoustic science lesson, students learn the types and parts of string instruments and create their own. They listen to classical music and identify...
Curated OER
Sounds Like Science - Drums
Students see that understanding how sound is produced makes it possible for us to manipulate it so we can decrease the number of unpleasant sounds we encounter. They make a drum to explore the concepts of force, pitch and volume.
Curated OER
Sounds Like Science: Drums
Students explore the science of sound. In this sound lesson plan, students craft drums from various materials and respond to questions regarding pitch, force, and volume.
Curated OER
Sound--Music or Noise?
Students are introduced to the concept of sound and how it is presented in the world around them. Using scientific terms, they describe the properties of sound and create their own definitions of sound, music, and noise. They demonstrate...
Curated OER
Sound and Hearing
Students discover how sound is produced by objects and picked up and heard by humans. Using musical instruments, they identify how the quality can affect the loudness, pitch and tone of the sound. They develop their own instrument or a...
Curated OER
An Introduction To The Instruments Of The Orchestra
Young scholars explore a variety of instruments to discover their sound. After watching an orchestra play, students discover the categories of instruments such as woodwinds, brass, strings, and percussion. In teams, they listen to...
Curated OER
Producing Beats
Turn your classroom into a music studio as groups work together to determine why music sounds different when performed live versus a recording. After listening to some different music, each group picks a poem, creates a recording, and...
Curated OER
Sounds You See, Hear, and Feel
Middle schoolers explore and create sound wave vibrations using musical instruments and common objects. They compare/contrast and describe actions that cause sound wave vibrations that can be seen, heard, and felt.
Curated OER
Musical Instruments - Woodwinds
Young scholars assemble and examine typical European orchestral woodwind instruments, determine how the instruments change pitch, identify common orchestral woodwind instruments by sound, and research a non-Euro-centric woodwind...
Curated OER
Making Waves, Making Music, Making Noise
Students construct "talking cans" and instruments to explain how vibration of objects produces various sounds.
Curated OER
Sounds Good To Me - Instrument Creation
Third graders differentiate between pitch and volume and explain how sound travels through different materials. They analyze sound waves for their basic characteristics. Students design an instrument based on the principles of sound...