Sound Engineering (6th Grade)

Parents and Guardians of all 6th grade students,

We have spent a few weeks identifying the properties of sound through exploration and the engineering process.  At this point, I am introducing to each class their sound engineering challenge.

Each class will be responsible for designing and creating 5-6 instruments over the course of the next few weeks.  The instruments will be created out of everyday materials, and they will be used to form a band, playing along to a song of my choice and/or class choice.  My goal is to have the students ready to “audition” for the band competition by late November – early December.  Each class band will be competing with each other for the Rising Star Competition.

This specific performance task was found on Defined STEM, a collection of performance tasks and resources to be used in classrooms.  Below you will find a document titled, Rising Star Competition, that explains that task in more detail.  Your child should be bringing this paper home with them this week.

As we begin our design process, your child may start asking for a few things to borrow from home. We are looking for common household items that are safe and inexpensive.  He/She may want to bring some household materials to school.  Please know that if your child brings materials from home, they will not be returned, so please don’t let them bring something to school to use as part of their instrument if you want it back.

I’m super excited to see what the students design as they prepare to enter our musical group competition! The 6th graders have shown creativity and innovation over the last few weeks – this should be a fun challenge for the students.

If you have any questions, please email me at amber_mccabe@elanco.org.

Sincerely, Mrs. Amber McCabe

Rising Star Competition

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