Follow the Sound!

by Greg Crowther

With a nod to circa-1980 hits like "Grease" (Frankie Valli) and "Fame" (Irene Cara), this song traces the follow of auditory information from the ear to the cortex of the brain.

CHORUS:
Follow the sound! Follow the sound!
Follow the sound from ear to brain!
Follow the sound! Follow the sound!
Baby, remember these names!

Sound waves beat on the tympanic membrane.
Ossicles beat on the oval window.
Perilymph, endolymph, basilar membrane.
Hair cells stimulate nerve eight, you know....

CHORUS

Cochlear nucleus.
Superior olivary nucleus.
Inferior colliculus.
Medial geniculate nucleus
Of the thalamus
To the temporal cortex.

CHORUS

• sheet music (with melody play-back)

Songs like this one can be used during class meetings and/or in homework assignments. Either way, the song will be most impactful if students DO something with it, as opposed to just listening.

An initial, simple follow-up activity could be to answer the study questions below. A more extensive interaction with the song might entail (A) learning to sing it, using an audio file and/or sheet music as a guide, and/or (B) illustrating it with pictures, bodily poses, and/or bodily movements. The latter activity could begin with students identifying the most important or most challenging content of the song, and deciding how to illustrate that particular content.

(1) How do the subdivisions of the ear -- outer ear, middle ear, and inner ear -- relate to the structures mentioned here?

(2) Hearing loss can be classified as "conductive" or "sensorineural." If a person has sensorneural hearing loss, which of the structures mentioned here could be to blame?

(3) The song lists each subcortical brain structure in the singular form (cochlear nucleus, superior olivary nucleus, etc.). How many of each of these structures do we have?

(4) Where in the brain is sensory information from both ears first combined and compared?

(5) The inferior collicular is part of the auditory pathway. What does the SUPERIOR colliculus do?