WAVES
From quantum physics to gravitation, from the micro to the macro scale, waves are pervasive in the physical world. A deep knowledge of the behavior of waves is not only fundamental to the physical sciences, but is also necessary for understanding diverse concepts in many fields such as chemistry, neurobiology, or geology, electronic and structural engineering. Moreover, understanding waves is a key element of understanding signal processing and is thus an important component of career preparedness for the information and communications technology (ICT) workplace and the entertainment industry. Listening to Waves builds a connection between a physical phenomenon that is ubiquitous in our everyday lives (sound), the physics behind this phenomenon (waves), and applications of this knowledge that might be conducive to careers in STEM.
SOUND AND MUSIC
The pervasiveness of sound, its ease of measurement, and its cultural relevance reveals the sonic world as a “natural laboratory” through which adolescents may become intuitively familiar with waves and their properties. From speech, to music, to street noise, sound is an integral part of our everyday lives. It is easy to measure and visualize, one only needs a microphone and a computer. People are intuitively familiar with many aspects of sound waves and their perceptual signatures such as pitch, timbre, loudness, direction, and echo. People are also familiar with many objects that generate sound (vocal chords, flutes, drums, strings). Sound is the material from which music is made; creating sounds constitutes a large portion of music-making.