You
were looking at beach sand !!!
Sands of the World !
Winner of the 1998 
"Best Internet
Use" Project Award
Sponsored by TECH CORPS Rhode
Island
Please
sign our guest book 
This is
an interactive web site for students in grades
3-12.
It is part of an ongoing project initiated by the Chariho Regional School District's M.I.
Smart! Program (Multiple Intelligences Program). Our campus is located in South
County, Rhode Island "The Ocean
State."
Although this
project is based on the discipline of Earth Science, it is our hope
to add activities which will incorporate all of the various
intelligences students possess.
We hope you will
join us in our
quest to examine the mineral and sound qualities of beach sand
throughout the globe!
If
you wish to participate, please follow the procedure
below:
Here's how you can become part of
our research:
Procedure:
1.
Gather a sand
sample from a local beach. (It
may be from the ocean, a lake shore, or even a desert).
2. Place it into a
small, sealed container such as an empty film canister or a zip-lock bag.
3.
Clearly
label the
container
with the following information:
Name of the beach; City and State where the beach is located; and if
possible, any other facts you feel would be interesting about the
site.
- 4. If possible, include a photograph
or drawing of the beach and one or two small rocks from that area. Please
send them, along with the sand sample to:
-
Mrs. Jane Carlson-Pickering
M.I.
Smart! Program Coordinator
Charlestown School
363 Carolina Back Road
Charlestown, R.I. 02813
Email: rif00227@ride.ri.net
If you wish to receive a
sample
of Rhode
Island beach
sand,
please send a
written request, via Email or snail mail, including your complete
mailing address, to the address above.
Analyze your own samples using our data
sheet
Mohegan Bluffs, Block
Island
Rhode Island Beach Sand
Composition
RI beach sand varies from
place to place, a
reflection of the variable bedrock source. Nevertheless, the main
mineral is quartz.
Sand derived from granites (the most common rock in the central and
western part of the state consists of quartz plus small amounts of
feldspar,
mica and
hornblende. Sand
derived from the metasedimentary rocks of the Narragansett Basin are
likely to be more diversified, perhaps with some garnet. Sand from other nearby beaches may have a slightly
different composition.
Singing Beach, in
Amino-Chou, Japan
What is musical
sand? Musical sand on a beach or desert is a silica
sand which makes a peculiar sound when moving. As the sound is
lovely, the sand became known as musical sand. "Singing sand"
on the beach is a small
scale phenomenon and "booming sand" in the desert is a very large scale one, but
the sounding mechanism and the quality of the sounds are essentially,
the same. Here we will refer to both types as "musical
sands".
Click here for 
"Singing
Sand."
Since the nineteenth
century, excited scientists
and researchers have reported discoveries of this sand all over the
world. For example, we can find short comments on the sand in
Charles Darwin's "Naturalist's Voyage in the Veagle"(1832) at
Rio-de-Janeiro in Brazil and Chile. In China, we can find a
large festival for booming sand in literature ( Report on Ton-Fan 880
AD.). It is recorded in the ancient manuscript as a mysterious
sand mountain. It says as follows: "When you ride a horse, or go
on a walking tour, the sound of stepping on the sand will reach some
dozens miles or so. On the boy's festival day, as was the
custom long ago, towns folk within the castle wall used to climb Mt.
Ming-sha-shan and slide down on the sand in union. The sliding
sound was almost like the rolling of thunder." Now the name of the mountain is "Singing
Mountain", and a temple in the
district is called the Thunder Temple.
Today, we are faced with two difficulties created by
the environmental changes of the earth. The first is the rapid loss of areas in the
world where singing sand still exists. The second is recognizing this
sound in its natural state.
Booming Sand Mt.-
Nevada Desert
Musical sand including both singing sand in the beach
and booming sand in the desert, is a natural art that has existed since the early
history of the Earth. The sand's mysterious sound has been worshipped
as a religious symbol, and it also has brought to humans a sense of
beauty. Unfortunately, the sands react sensitively to air and sea
water pollution, and may actually act as a sensor for the
presence of pollution. Therefore, musical sand is now an
important inheritance of the Earth.
Eureka Valley sand dunes in Death Valley National Park, California
has the highest dunes in North America, and they BOOM loudly when they
slip. You can both hear and feel
the vibrations.
Booming Dunes- Badain
desert, Japan.
Harmonic
(musical) tone is delightful to the human ear, hence the sand was
named singing or musical sand throughout the world. ( For
example, hundreds of years ago, the sand of KOTO beach was so named
for sounding like a Japanese harp).
The singing properties of
the sand are very sensitive to pollution, in that they can be acting as a sensor for
it. Therefore, the quality of the sound producing property of
singing sand on the beach is a sign that shows purity of sea
water. If we can recover clean sea, the sands in the world will
recover the song.
Nature may
continue to try to revive the sound by wave motion in the seas or
wind action in the deserts. However, she may be defeated by
crowds of tourists in many places which tends to kill the booming
sand. Now, our world's musical sands are confronted by
two difficulties induced by their environmental changes.
At least 30
"booming" dunes have been found in deserts and on beaches in North
and South America, Asia, Africa and elsewhere.
Here
are the locations of some singing/booming sands of the
world:
North America:
Manchester Beach, Massachusetts
Sand Mountain, Nevada
Kelso Dunes, California
Mountain of the Bell, Mexico
Roaring Sands, Kauai, Hawaii
Nihau Island, Hawaii
South
America:
El Bramador, Chile
El Punto de Diablol
Europe:
Eigg, Scotland
Asia:
Dunhuang, China
Korizo, Libya
Gelf Kebib, Liby
Africa:
Kalahari Desert, South Africa
Namib Desert, Namibia
Bir el Abbes, Algeria
Click to hear booming sand.
Nima Sand Museum,
Japan
What's the NIMA SAND MUSEUM?
A famous singing
beach, "Kotoga beach (Koto
mean Japanese harp)" is in the town of the same name. The townspeople
have an old legend related to the Beach name.
The Nima Sand Museum was opened to the public on March
3,1991. The museum was built as a symbol of singing sand in the
world. The museum
consists of a cluster of six glass pyramids. The largest of
these is twenty-one meters high and rests on a base whose four sides
are each 17 meters long. Inside the main pyramid stands the world's
largest hourglass, five meters high and 1 meter in diameter.
One ton of sand (whose millions of grains have been sorted to make
sure each one is about 0.13 millimeters), flows from the upper bulb
to the lower bulb. The so-called "sand calendar" is carefully turned over by a group of
townspeople at twelve midnight on the last day of every
year. It takes exactly one year for all the sand to flow
through, which is why this hourglass is called the "one year sand
clock". The sand has continuously flowed through the
nozzle (0.85mm diameter) during the 6 years since the museum opened
. Under the hourglass, there is a large hall, which
houses an interesting center for learning and study.
Hour Glass "Sand
Calendar"
Singing Sand in Water:
"Frog
Sand"
To recover the
sound, a milling machine was used to create a mechanical simulation
of natural wave action. Osodani, a beach in the Pliocene epoch, is
located in the inland area of Japan. There, a clayish sand layer
was found. After washing
the sand for a very long period of time (Over 500 hours!) you can get
an almost pure quartz variety, (99%). The sand shows its singing
property in air and in water.
Because the sound in water is a good likeness to the sound of a crying
frog, it was called frog sand.
The sound
producing device is a container made with an acrylic resin pipe
(diameter is 5 cm, length10 cm), closed at both ends by a 1 mm thick
acrylic plate.
In
the container, 100 cc of water and the sand were
sealed.
1. If you move the container slowly
right to left, you can hear a frog-like sound.
2. Don't touch both side plates, for they
are sonic plates.
3. Don't give it a shock.
To
hear the "Frog Sand" 
Sands of the World Sampler:
Examine microscopic grains of sand from numerous
locations around the world. See just how
different they can be!
Sand-sational
Facts: Did you know that .
. . ?
Sandy Sentiments: Can you
figure out the meaning of these "Sandy
Phrases?"
Collect
Data on your own Sand Samples
Rockhounds
Information Page An index of
additional links for all you Rockhounds to explore. Don't
forget to bring along your equipment!
Bob's Rock
Shop Browse through one man's
awesome collection of over 150 rocks and minerals!
United
States Geological Society (Rhode Island Information Page) Here's where you can get the
scoop on what projects geologists in R.I. are presently
working.
Kotohiki
Beach, Japan Learn more about the
phenomenon of "singing sand"
Geology
Link K-12 Forum This site will take you on a
journey to become a geologist. Terrific activities, photos, and
resources.
Smithsonian
Gems and Minerals Collection WOW! Photos and
information about the most spectacular gems and minerals in the
world.
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