• Make sound barrier projects.pink foam image by laurent dambies from Fotolia.com
  
  Teaching children through science experiments and projects not only gets them up and moving around, it gives them a hands-on reference for key concepts and ideas. By experiencing scientific rules this way, they retain information more easily and can connect it to future lessons.
  
  This method works especially well for intangible lessons like ones about sound. You can tell students how sound travels and which materials block or enhance it, but showing them cements the lesson in their minds.
  
  

Insulation Materials

• This experiment shows students which materials are best and worst at blocking sounds. The teacher splits the class into four or five groups and gives each group a plastic container and an insulating material. These materials may include packing peanuts, upholstery foam, water, wood chips, shredded paper and more. The groups each construct an insulation chamber and place a battery-powered radio inside. Each radio should play the same music at the same volume level. The students listen to the music through each insulation chamber and write down which they think is the most effective. Dense materials, like upholstery foam and packed wood chips, should be the most effective. Water moves easily and actually carries sound vibrations further.
  
  

Wall Thickness

• This experiment demonstrates how thick walls should be in housing to block outside noise. The teacher splits the class into groups of two or three and gives each one a cardboard box and square Styrofoam sheets of different thicknesses. One group gets 1 1/2-inch pieces while another gets 1 1/4-inch and a third might get 2-inch or 3-inch thick pieces. Each group slips a battery-powered noisemaker into their box and uses the materials to line their box in an attempt to make a soundproof chamber. Each group may use up to three layers of material to do this. The students then listen to each chamber and decide which one was the most successful. The thickest sheets should be most effective since the sound vibrations have to travel through more material.
  
  

Sound Barrier Vacuum

• This project demonstrates that sound must have air to travel. With no air, the sound cannot vibrate and won't travel as far. The teacher splits the students into groups of three or four and gives each one two glass jars of the same size and shape along with two battery-powered noisemakers. The children turn the noisemakers on to the same volume and place one down inside a jar turned so the opening points toward the ceiling. They cover the other noisemaker with the second jar by placing the jar over the noisemaker with the opening flush to a desk surface. The noisemaker beneath the jar should make less noise because there is less air inside that jar. Air can circulate freely through the other jar, so that noisemaker is louder even though the glass acts as a slight insulator.