Rainstick

Supplies and Materials

• Use a hollow tube (paper towel roll?)

• paint or color markers

• some type of beads to put inside (rice? Large beans? Small beans?)

• thin wire, pipe cleaners, or garden twine

• pencil

• paper

• tape

Assembly

Begin by creating an interesting design on your towel roll. You may want to add some images that have personal significance, describe some of the things that are happening right now, or show things we can do to help change the world into a better place. You make want to begin with a pencil sketch, especially if you want a more intricate or detailed picture or pattern. Now add some colour.

Now you need something for the beans to HIT on their way down through the tube. Find some kind of wire (pipe cleaners? Garden twine?) and wrap it round and round a pencil. Seal one side of your tube by cutting a circle of paper a little larger than the end of your roll and taping it firmly in place. Remove the pencil from inside your twirled wire and stick the wire and the beans inside the tube. Seal the other end.

I Wonder...

• Listen to the sounds your rainstick can produce. Does it sound different when you tip it slowly?

• How does the speed of the tip change the sound?

• Is it louder when you tip it completely upside down?

• What changes when you use small pieces of rice? lima beans? small pebbles?

• How does the sound change when you have both small and large beans?

• What do you think the science behind why your instrument produces different sounds is?