How Sound Travels
Understand that sound is made by vibration and travels through materials.
Sound is made when something vibrates.
- Explain what vibration is.
- Say how sound travels to the ear.
- Compare how sound travels through solids, water and air.
Vibration Makes Sound
Pluck a rubber band and watch it shake. That shaking is called vibration. The vibrating band pushes the air around it, and the pushes travel to your ear as sound.
Sound Needs a Medium
Sound travels through solids, liquids and gases. Put your ear against a table and tap the other end — the sound travels through the wood. Sound cannot travel through empty space because there is nothing to carry the vibration.
Gently touch your throat and hum. Can you feel the vibration?
Stretch a rubber band between two fingers and pluck it. What do you see and hear?
Practice
- What is vibration?
- Name three materials sound can travel through.
- Explain why you can hear a knock on a table when your ear is pressed to it.
Recap
Sound comes from vibration and travels through solids, liquids and gases to reach our ears.
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