Who should worry about noise?
We all should- no matter how old or young you are, too much exposure to loud noise can permanently damage your hearing.
We discussed what sorts of noises occur in an early childhood centre,
-dishwasher
-phone
-carpentry
-crying
-squealing
-talking
-music
-traffic outside (sirens etc)
Tim said, early childhood centres are in actual fact at industrial level for sound.
He gave ideas on evaluating sound in the centre, such has videoing different areas and listening to how noisy these are. He suggested that within a centre we should have quiet zones, and around these quiet zones there shouldn't be noisy experiences.
As teachers and parents we can encourage children with
-having inside voices
-role modelling
-talking to squealing children (talk about it hurts our ears)
-stories sometimes (at lunch times, so it's not as noisy with lots of back ground talking)
-sing songs at a normal tone, then whisper (showing different levels of sound)
Jessie and I believed KIDSPACE has good acoustics, inside and also in the art room. Tim also discussed that if the teachers eat well then we have the energy to support children with the awareness of noise and trying to lower noise levels in our centre.
Tim introduced a noise meter machine "The National Foundation for the Deaf inc" had designed, based on an 11 year old girls model of a noise reading meter. This meter has three lights like a traffic light. The meter measures sounds ranging from 80 decibels to 90 decibels, when any given area is getting too noisy the lights will glow from green to amber to red- at maximum level. This noise meter would be a fantastic tool at KIDSPACE, so if anyone is happy to donate towards purchasing one of these this would be fantastic.
Lets protect the taringa (ears) of our tamariki ma (children).
For more information please go to www.nfd.org.nz
Tamara
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