primary: can you trust your ears

Which sound makers make the loudest sounds? Can you trust your ears to decide? In this activity you will use the computer to measure how loud sounds are.

You need

Sound makers. Computer and the sound sensor.

Investigate

1. Which sounds will you test? Will you play the sound makers ‘hard’ or ‘soft’?

2. Try the sound makers and decide which sounds are quiet and which ones are loud.

3. Test each sound using the sound sensor. 4. Record the sound level in your table.

Questions

1. Did you and the others agree on what was ‘loud’ and ‘quiet’?

2. Sort the sound makers into order, loudest first

3. Make a sound level scale with the numbers from 0 to 100. Mark it to show Quiet, Loud, and Very loud.

4. Do your ears and the sound sensor disagree?

Extra

If you drop something, does it make more noise if you drop it from higher up?