What are sounds and how are they made? Let's find out!
Watch and learn
What are sounds?
Do you know what sound is?
All sounds share one thing in common. They are caused when something vibrates.
This means it shakes or wobbles very quickly.
Tiny shaking movements back and forth are called Sorry, something went wrongCheck your connection, refresh the page and try again.. The vibrations travel from the object through the air to our ears where our brains work out what the sound is and what it means.
Vibrations can be produced in lots of different ways.
Try this
Play music through a speaker.
Gently touch the surface of the speaker.
Can you feel the vibrations?
How can you make sounds?
Can you think of different ways you can make a sound?
Lots of different things make different sounds.
You can make sounds with your voice, with different objects, or even with musical instruments.
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Why do different objects make different sounds?
Different objects make different sounds depending on the materials they are made of, how the vibrations are produced, and how big they are.
All these things can change the volume of sounds.
Hitting a tin can with a spoon makes a loud sound because the hard metal vibrates well.
Hitting a pillow makes a quiet sound because the pillow is made of soft materials that don't vibrate very well.
The volume of a sound means how loud or quiet it is.
Hitting a cymbal softly makes a quiet sound.
Hitting a cymbal hard makes a very loud sound.
The size of object making a sound can change how loud it is.
A small mouse makes a quiet squeak.
A big lion makes a loud roar.
Sounds and our ears
Very loud sounds can damage our ears. 馃憘
Sometimes we have to protect our ears from loud sounds, for example workers on a building site or at a noisy airport wear ear defenders.馃带
We all hear sounds slightly differently; some sounds we like and other sounds we don't like.
Music is composed to sound nice but a smoke alarm is designed to sound uncomfortable so we have to take some action.
What sounds do you like? 馃憤
What sounds do you not like? 馃憥
Keywords
Sorry, something went wrongCheck your connection, refresh the page and try again. 鈥 What an object is made of, for example wood, metal, plastic, glass or cloth.
Sorry, something went wrongCheck your connection, refresh the page and try again. 鈥 Tiny movements back and forth in a material.
Sorry, something went wrongCheck your connection, refresh the page and try again. 鈥 How loud or quiet a sound is.
Activity
Science lab:
Make your own musical sounds!
You will need:
kitchen pots and pans
a tea towel
different objects to hit them with (e.g. a wooden spoon, a pencil, a straw)
Quiz
Do you want to find out how much you've learned about making sounds? Try our fun quiz!
More on Forces, electricity and waves
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