Introduction: What did we cover in the last lesson?

5 minutes

Activity 1: Data representation of audio

30 minutes

Activity 2: New Sonic Pi commands (additive and subtractive synthesis with sine, sawtooth, triangle waves)

30 minutes

Activity 3: Reflection of progress so far and class discussion of selected listening examples

10 minutes

Activity 4: Student time for group projects

20 minutes

Wrap-up Activity: Quiz and reflection

15 minutes

Key concepts

Sonic Pi syntax to be taught this lesson

Interdisciplinary Curriculum Links

Learning Outcomes

Computational Thinking

Programming

Music

(strands)

Music:

-reverb, delay, distortion

-attack, release sustain, decay

-sine, sawtooth, triangle waves

Programming:

-decomposition (making synthesisers)

-abstraction

-bits to audio (data representation)

-methods

Activity #1

(none)

Activity #2

with_fx:

-reverb

-echo

synth: (sine, square, saw, tri)

-attack -release -sustain -decay

Activity #3 and #4

(none)

Abstraction, debugging, decomposition

Methods, parameters

PK, DI

Music:

-All students will create their own unique sounds using additive and subtractive synthesis

-All students will use basic effects e.g. reverb, delay, cutoff

Programming:

-All students will create and use their own personalised synthesiser

-All students will explore attack, release and sustain of synthesising a unique and personalised electronic instrument

Student Activity:

1. For three minutes, students are to reflect on the code they saved at the end of the previous lesson
2. The teacher should roam the room, quickly surveying the code produced and ask a sample of students about key music and programming concepts covered in the previous lesson
3. If the teacher deems necessary, have a 2-3 minute discussion on identified concepts that need to be reinforced

Notes to the Teacher:

• Reflection will begin each lesson in this unit and the teacher should try to get around to all groups every two lessons

Suggested Teacher Instruction Sequence:

1. Watch “Morse code & Trying to make Will remember” [1.19 minutes] from the Netflix TV series ‘Stranger Things’ 2x08. → how long and short sounds can be converted into text messages
2. Play https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmY7pOQCOr8 (how sound and images are represented in computers) [2 minute video]
3. Explain that computers do everything with just 0s and 1s (or two different states like high voltage and low voltage). This means a picture can be represented as audio and a piece of music can be represented as a picture, because to a computer, the files are just a bunch of 0s and 1s

Suggested links and resources to facilitate activities:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQSXlFe9LZ0 morse code in sound from “Morse code & Trying to make Will remember” from the Netflix TV series Stranger Things 2x08

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-OxzIC6pic How sound and images are represented in computers

Student Activity (20 minutes):

1. Class discussion prompt: How do computers store and play audio?

New Sonic Pi syntax to introduce in this activity (click for example code):

synth: (sine, square, saw, tri) attack release sustain decay. E.g. synth :sine, note: :c4, attack: 2, release: 1, sustain: 2, decay: 2

with_fx :reverb do

play 60

sleep 1

end

Suggested Teacher Instruction Sequence:

1. Introduce students to the idea of harmonics in different instruments with Google Chrome experiments spectrogram https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Spectrogram/
2. Introduce students to synthesis with https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Oscillators/ https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Harmonics/ to explore different kinds of oscillators → Give students two minutes to experiment with this interactive
3. Demonstrate how to make a new instrument synthesizer with synth: (sine, square, saw, tri) attack release sustain decay. E.g. synth :sine, note: :c4, attack: 2, release: 1, sustain: 2, decay: 2
4. Demonstrate how to add audio effects reverb and echo (there are many more). E.g:

with_fx :reverb do

  play 60

  sleep 1

end

Suggested links and resources to facilitate activities:

• Google Chrome experiments spectrogram https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Spectrogram/ 

• Synthesis with https://musiclab.chromeexperiments.com/Oscillators/

  
  

Student Activity (20 minutes):

1. Students experiment making their own synthesizer individually separate from their own projects
2. Students integrate experiments into their own composition
3. Students experiment with audio effects in their individual project

Notes to the Teacher:

(none)

Suggested Teacher Instruction Sequence:

→ standups

→ class demonstration of individual projects only for those that volunteer

→ Students get 5 minutes to listen to each other’s work and give constructive feedback feedback

Student Activity (15 minutes):

1. [Standups] Give students 2 minutes to think of what to say and who is going to go first
2. Commence standups. Tell students that they will be completing a reflection diary at the end of the lesson and they can use the information they talk report in their stand-up for this
3. Give students 5 minutes to listen to each other’s work and give each other constructive feedback
4. Ask students if there is anyone who would like to play their composition so far to the class (only willing volunteers)

Notes to the teacher:

• As per lesson #2

• Remind students about giving helpful and constructive feedback

Teacher Instruction:

(none)

Activity (20 minutes):

Student instruction similar to Activity #2 with their group projects

1. Students experiment making their own synthesizer separate from their own projects in their groups
2. Students integrate experiments into their group composition
3. Students experiment with audio effects in their group project

Notes to the teacher:

(none)

Student Activity (10 minutes):

• Students individually complete the quiz and reflection on the key concepts in this lesson within 10 minutes linked here.

Contact info

petriechris@gmail.com 

Credits

Developed by Chris Petrie.

Last updated on

27/06/2018

Copyright info

The content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License, and code samples are licensed under the Apache 2.0 License.