Doing Science with FractalMom: The Sounds That Surround Us

All sorts of animals make sounds, including humans!  So do cars, and refrigerators and hammers.  Even inside our houses, we notice the sounds from wind and rain.  But all these sounds combine to make our soundscape, the sounds that surround us.  In this class we will listen to penguins and whales, and bats and fish, and children singing.  We will compare these sounds to sounds we each hear around us during the class, and  see what sound is telling us all the time about our world.  We will focus on dividing our soundscape based on the sources of the sounds— animals?  (Biophony); weather? (Geophony); human activities? (Anthrophony).  We will talk about how the soundscape links to biodiversity, and how it influences our quality of life.  We will also talk about three types of sounds, each of which influences us differently.  Sound markers tell you where you are when you close your eyes. Sound signals communicate something-- a warning,  your name, dinnertime!   Sound perturbations interrupt everything-- without adding any useful information. Then we will all take a moment to draw what we heard in class.  Before the second week, each of us will do a fifteen minute SoundWalk around our neighbourhood.  It can be down your street, in a nearby park, or anywhere you would like to walk while you listen carefully and note down everything you hear. You can write the sound itself, « wooooooo », or the source « fire truck », or draw it!   For the second class, each of us will share what we heard.   There is an optional experiment/demo showing how vibrations from your own voice can make grains of rice dance around.  If you like learning about your Soundscape, you can join us at Project NIPI and we will measure sound levels, share recordings, and see how much sound, and how much biodiversity we can document around home as a team.