The Five Senses - Lesson 3: Hearing
Activity - Talking Tubes
Objective
Student can say that sound travels.
Materials
Paper-towel tubes; a ticking clock or timer; plastic tubing six feet to
eight feet in length (available at hardware or pet stores); two funnels; masking
tape
Procedures
- Place a ticking clock or timer on one end of a wooden table. Place one
opening of a cardboard tube on the other end of the table. The students take
turns holding an ear to the other end of the tube to hear the ticking coming
through the tube.
- Attach a funnel to each end of the plastic tubing, using masking tape.
Partners stand six to eight feet apart while one whispers a message to her/his partner too
quietly for the partner to hear. The first child then whispers the message into
one of the funnels while the second child listens through the other. The partners
take turns listening and whispering.
Getting the Idea
Explain to students that the ear is something like a tube with a funnel. Sound
comes in through the outer part of the ear - which is like the funnel - and
travels through a tube called the auditory canal.
Ask the students to list every object that was vibrating to make the sound heard.
(The clock, when it ticked, vibrated, and because it was sitting on the table
made the wood vibrate; the sound traveled through the wood and through the air in
the cardboard tube to the person's ear.) When the students whispered without the
aid of the funnel, the sound was not loud enough to be heard from that distance,
but it did cause vibrations, otherwise you could not have heard whispering. The
sound waves also traveled through the air and though the funnel.
After this activity, the teacher gives the rest of the explanation of the way the
ear functions in hearing.
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