Name: ________________________________________ Grade & Section: _______________ Date: _______

ST. PAUL UNIVERSITY ILOILO

Gen. Luna St., Iloilo City
SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL DEPARTMENT
Senior High School Department

WORKSHEET # 3: WAVES AND SOUND

Part I.
A: Crest
A
B
B: Wavelength

C: Amplitude C

D: Trough
F
E: Wavelength
D E

F: Amplitude

Wave 1
Frequency

1.How many wavelengths long is Wave 1? 2

wavelengths

2.How many wavelengths long is Wave 2? 2.5 wavelengths

3.How many wavelengths long is Wave 3? 1.5 wavelengths

Wave 2
4.Which wave has the highest frequency?
Wave 2

5.Which wave has the lowest frequency? Wave 3

6.What is the definition of frequency? The number of

waves in a given time.

Wave 3 7. How can you tell by looking at it if a wave has high or

low frequency? You can tell based on how spread out or
close the waves are.

Frequency Connection

There are three members of a family. The dad has a deep, low voice. The mom has a medium-high
voice, and the baby has the highest voice.
8. Which wave belongs to the dad’s voice? ______Wave 3_________
9. Which wave belongs to the mom’s voice? Wave 1

10.Which wave belongs to the baby’s voice? Wave 2

Wave 4

1.Which wave has the highest amplitude? Wave 5

2.Which wave has the lowest amplitude? Wave 4

Wave 5 3.Use a ruler and measure the amplitude of Wave 5: 0. 5 inches

4.What is the definition of amplitude? The distance from the equilibrium

to the crest or trough.

5.How can you tell by looking at it if a wave has high

or low amplitude? Based on how tall the wave is.

Wave 6

Amplitude Connection
Juan is playing the piano. The music starts of at meso-forte (medium high volume). It then crescendos
into
forte (loud) and Juan plays dramatically. The music ends at piano (quietly) with a sweet melody.

1. Which wave represents the music at the beginning? Wave 6

2. Which wave represents the music in the middle? Wave 5
3. Which wave represents the music at the end? Wave 4

Final Waves Goodbye

Compare waves A-D by both amplitude and frequency to the Standard Wave. (Higher/Lower/Same)
Standard Wave

A
B

Higher Amplitude; Same Frequency Lower Amplitude; Higher Frequency

D
C

Amplitude; Frequency
Same Amplitude; Lower Frequency
Part II. This activity uses PhET simulation – Waves Intro. Select the sound option.

This is a guided inquiry task. You must read and follow the instructions carefully.

1 Amplitude of sound waves

Tick Play Tone and Particles. Move the Amplitude slider to halfway.
Press the green button on the speaker.

What happens to the particles?

1. When sound waves start, the particles closest to the speaker vibrates back and
forth. When it gets pushed back, it hits the air molecule next to it, which then also
vibrates back and forth, and a ripple effect keeps going.
2. The individual particles do not travel with the wave but really, they just vibrate
back and forth transferring the pulse away from the speaker.

Move the Amplitude slider up and down. How does the sound change?

When I move the Amplitude slider up, the sound changes, it gets louder than when
it was in the middle. When I move it down, the sound gets lower and dims. This is
because the amplitude is how high and low a sound wave is. Higher sound waves
are louder to us than the lower sound waves.
____________________________________________________________________

How does the motion of the particles change?

I noticed while moving the amplitude higher and lower is that the higher I move it,
the more distinct the waves are. The particles vibrate further, and I can see clearly
where the air particles are compressing and the decompressing spots. When I turn
the amplitude lower, the particles are still moving but instead of seeing them go in
waves, they are just vibrating slightly. This showed that the more they vibrate, the
taller that wave is.
____________________________________________________________________

Does the position of the pattern change? The pause button and tape might help.
When I pressed the green button for the sound to start, I focused my attention on
only one red particle. I saw that once the waves start hitting it, it does move but
the pattern does not change. This particle will vibrate and hit the next particle but it
will not move further than the spot it is on. For this reason, the position of the
pattern does not change.
____________________________________________________________________

Click the Waves button. The Wave setting shows areas where the particles are
pushed together as light coloured and where they are far apart as dark.

Vary the amplitude and check what you wrote about the position of the pattern.

Sound waves are pressure waves in the air. In areas where the particles are
compressed the air pressure is high and where the particles are spread out (we
call that rarefaction) the pressure is low.

The wavelength of a sound wave is the distance between 2 compression areas or 2

rarefaction areas. Use the pause button and tape to measure the wavelength of
your soundwave.
_____105.3________ cm = ___1.053_______ m

You can use the pressure meter tool to keep track of the pressure at a particular
place over time. Place one of the detectors into the middle of your box.

Use the pause button to see that a high pressure reading matches a bright band
and area of compression and that a low pressure reading matches an area of
rarefaction.

Set the amplitude to zero. This is the where the particles would be if there is no
sound.

Slowly increase the amplitude and look at the pressure tool.

 Sketch the shape of the pressure wave on the diagrams below.

Low Amplitude High Amplitude

The time it takes for a full sound wave to pass a point is called the period of the
wave. Use the stopwatch tool with the pressure tool to measure the time it takes
for 10 compression areas to pass.

Low Amplitude __________30.44________ milliseconds

High Amplitude __________30.57 _______milliseconds

2 Frequency of sound waves

Tick Play Tone and Particles. Move the Frequency and Amplitude slider to
halfway.
Press the green button on the speaker.

Move the Frequency slider up and down. How does the sound change?

While moving the Frequency slider up and down we can hear a clear difference
from when it is lower and higher. The higher we slide the bar, the higher pitch it
gets, the lower we slide it the lower the pitch gets. When we increase the
frequency, it increases the number of waves there are. Higher frequency equals
more pulses and resulting in a higher pitch in our ears.

How does the motion of the particles change?

Frequency is the amount of pulse the transverse wave does per second. One way I learned
to remember this is by remembering that the frequency is how frequent it happens. What I
noticed that was happening while increasing the frequency was that the air particles were
moving at a faster rate. When I lowered it, they would slow down again.

Click the Waves button.

Reduce the frequency to minimum. Use the pause and tape tool to measure the
wavelength. Repeat for maximum frequency.

min Frequency wavelength = _______151.9______ m

max Frequency wavelength = _______0.805______ m

You can use the pressure meter tool to keep track of the pressure at a particular
place over time. Place one of the detectors into the middle of your box.

Slowly vary the frequency using the slider, monitor the pressure wave.
Sketch the shape of the pressure wave on the diagrams below.

Low Frequency High Frequency

 Use the stopwatch tool with the pressure tool to measure the time it takes for 10
compression areas to pass. Use the times to calculate the period and complete the
table below.

Low Frequency High Frequency

Time for 10 waves 50.18 ms 22.66 ms
/ ms
Period /s 0.05018 ms 0.02266 ms

SUMMARY TASK

1. Look at the words below. Consider whether you associate them with amplitude or frequency and place them into
the table.

Pitch Volume Wavelength Period Vibration size

amplitude frequency

 Volume  Pitch
 Period  Wavelength
 Vibration Size

2. Draw on the diagram a wavelength between compression areas and a wavelength between rarefactions. Check
they are the same length.

Compression wavelengths ______71.5_____ cm Rarefaction wavelengths _______71.5____ cm