VICTOR MINCES
University of California, San Diego
Listening to Waves
NSF Awards: 1657366
This piece showcases our work in schools promoting the science of music as a way of enrich the students everyday experience. Our project uses hands on activities such as sound editing, sound exploration, and the creation of musical instruments.
Listening to Waves
NSF Awards: 1657366
This piece showcases our work in schools promoting the science of music as a way of enrich the students everyday experience. Our project uses hands on activities such as sound editing, sound exploration, and the creation of musical instruments.
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Public Discussion
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Gillian Puttick
Senior Scientist
I see very high engagement in the classroom from all the students which is a wonderful outcome alone! I especially like the way in which students can immediately connect a sound they make with a visualization of that sound. Could you say a little more about how students build on the visualizations to make meaning?
Victor Minces
Science of Music in Schools
Dear Dr. Puttick.
We discuss what they are seeing in the screen. They usually have some familiarity with it from soundcloud or voice messages on their phones. We discuss how the sound signal gets into the computer. What microphones are and how they work. We also change the time scale so they can "zoom in" into the sound and really see the waveforms (which are a reflection of how the objects generating the sound are vibrating). We are working with teachers to put this in a clear lesson plan form. This will soon be on our website.
Matt Fisher
Professor
I like the combination of engaging students through multiple senses at the same time - seeing, hearing, touching. Can you say more about the specific learning goals (knowledge and/or affective) that the project has for students? Have you been able to collect any evidence at this point that provides insight on how those goals are being met?
I recognize that my question about evidence might be premature based on where the project is in terms of timeline. So please feel free to answer that question in the context of future efforts if that is more appropriate.
Victor Minces
Science of Music in Schools
Dear Dr. Fisher, thanks for your comment.
The main goal of the project is for students to connect with science like scientists do. Through the sense of wonder towards natural phenomena. Because of that, we do not evaluate content learning per se, but focus on engagement and on the students' relationship with science (see more below). That said, students show their knowledge by doing and discussing. For example, an activity shown in the video is sound editing, which we use as an introduction to sound engineering. All of the groups participating in the study are able to accomplish some basic tasks in sound editing. As creating different tracks, changing time scales, copying and pasting signals, and applying signal processing effects such as speeding up or slowing down. Students also demonstrate (by doing) that they can understand how objects vibrate by finding the vibration nodes and mounting the pipes on such nodes. Regarding engagement, we do ethnographic analyses and student surveys. The student surveys show that students significantly increase their interest in pursuing a science career, they are more likely to agree to the statement "I am good at science" or "I can become good at science", they are more likely to state that science was one of their favorite subjects in the last few weeks (the program meets with them 3 times over 3 weeks and collaborates with the science teachers providing content), and they are less likely to agree with the statement that "science is boring". The ethnographic analysis is just starting.
Samantha Haimowitz
Very interesting!
Victor Minces
Victor Minces
Science of Music in Schools
Thanks!
Please check our website for super engaging online tools to analyze sound and make music.
www.listeningtowaves.com >> sound exploration
We are also developing lesson plans that are not online yet, but I'll be happy to share them with you.
Satyanand Singh
Captivating work!
Victor Minces
Science of Music in Schools
Thanks!
Please check our website for super engaging online tools to analyze sound and make music.
www.listeningtowaves.com >> sound exploration
Peg Cagle
math teacher & math department chair
Being invited to be noisy is instantly appealing to students, many of whom spend a significant part of their school days being shushed. I am curious to know more about how often you are working with the same group of students, how the project involves teachers in the work, and what sorts of metrics you are using to determine impact(s) of the project.
Victor Minces
Science of Music in Schools
Dear Dr. Cagle.
Yes! The students seem to enjoy very much that they are allowed to make noise. It can actually be a challenge when I am trying to provide guidance, as they usually want to keep playing, and playing is noisy!
Regarding how often I work with the students:
I typically work for approximately 6 hours per class, over the course of three weeks. I also provide content for the teachers to use. In particular, they use some of the tools developed by my team, which you can see in our website: www.listeningtowaves.com >> sound exploration.
Regarding metrics:
We have applied surveys addressing self efficacy and engagement with science, developed by our evaluator Brenda Turnbull, from Policy Studies Associates.
The student surveys show that students significantly increase their interest in pursuing a science career, they are significantly more likely to agree to the statement "I am good at science" or "I can become good at science", they are significantly more likely to state that science was one of their favorite subjects in the last few weeks, and they are significantly less likely to agree with the statement that "science is boring".
In addition, we are performing ethnographic analyses to understand how "awe" influences the students' perception of science. This part of the research is just starting.
Christopher Cappelli
Thank you for your video. It is great to see students so engaged in the classroom. Connecting the dots between the STEM subjects with engaging activities is extremely important for students to develop an interest in STEM without the fear that textbooks and tests bring. Can you talk more about how these activities are integrated into the school's curriculum, or if they are integrated with any existing science standards? Have you done any work to see how the science of music activities are impacting students? I saw career awareness as one example in the video, maybe you could speak to that? Thank you so much for sharing your work!
Victor Minces
Science of Music in Schools
Thanks for your interest. My ultimate goal is to have the science (and engineering) of music integrated and used into the school curriculum around the country. Regarding specific contents, the program fits pretty good with the waves requirements in the 8th grade standards. However, I think we can go deeper by framing the activities as science practices and cross cutting concepts. For example, we work a lot with patterns and (time) scales. When we apply the program, we collaborate with science teachers, showing them how to use the tools in our website (see: listeningtowaves.com >> sound exploration). I visit the classrooms approximately three times over the course of a month (while the students are learning about waves). We also have a series of mini-documentaries for career awareness, which will be soon featured in our website but please send me an email if you want to access them now. Regarding impact on students, I copy and paste one of my responses above:
The main goal of the project is for students to connect with science like scientists do. Through the sense of wonder towards natural phenomena. Because of that, we do not evaluate content learning per se, but focus on engagement and on the students' relationship with science (see more below). That said, students show their knowledge by doing and discussing. For example, an activity shown in the video is sound editing, which we use as an introduction to sound engineering. All of the groups participating in the study are able to accomplish some basic tasks in sound editing. As creating different tracks, changing time scales, copying and pasting signals, and applying signal processing effects such as speeding up or slowing down. Students also demonstrate (by doing) that they can understand how objects vibrate by finding the vibration nodes and mounting the pipes on such nodes. Regarding engagement, we do ethnographic analyses and student surveys. The student surveys show that students significantly increase their interest in pursuing a science career, they are more likely to agree to the statement "I am good at science" or "I can become good at science", they are more likely to state that science was one of their favorite subjects in the last few weeks (the program meets with them 3 times over 3 weeks and collaborates with the science teachers providing content), and they are less likely to agree with the statement that "science is boring". The ethnographic analysis is just starting.
Tom Yeh
I really enjoyed reading about your project. The video shows several creative unplugged activities to expose students to sounds and their relationships to the physical and tangible I can't help but thinking about those activities' broader appeal to students with visual impairments. I am glad to hear that your students are also showing gain in their confidence in being good or becoming good at science. Great work!
Your project seems to focus on middle school students. I am wondering whether you have explored other age groups.
Victor Minces
Science of Music in Schools
Dear Professor Yeh,
I am glad you enjoyed reading about the project. I love it too. I have recently been thinking that children with visual impairments could enjoy the experience too. I would like to explore that some day, I have my plate a bit full now though. I see from your website that you work with such students, I'd be happy to brainstorm if you want to add sound experiences to your program.
I have been focusing on 8th grade (I started there because is a pivotal age for science engagement), but my plan is to expand into other age ranges and demographics. I think that the sound exploration/music making tools in my website are playful enough that people of all ages could enjoy. And the unplugged activities as well.
I like the unplugged activites very much, but they are hard to replicate for public school teachers with 150 students and very short budgets. My vision is to train and stimulate teachers to use the online tools, and personally visit schools with the unplugged sound toys.
If you'd like to make music while exploring the science of sound go to www.listeningtowaves.com >> sound exploration.
And please contact me with any ideas or questions. Thanks so much for the interest.
Victor
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