A survey of acoustic conditions and noise levels in secondary school classrooms in England

Abstract

An acoustic survey of secondary schools in England has been undertaken. Room acoustic parameters and background noise levels were measured in 185 unoccupied spaces in 13 schools to provide information on the typical acoustic environment of secondary schools. The unoccupied acoustic and noise data were correlated with various physical characteristics of the spaces. Room height and the amount of glazing were related to the unoccupied reverberation time and therefore need to be controlled to reduce reverberation to suitable levels for teaching and learning. Further analysis of the unoccupied data showed that the introduction of legislation relating to school acoustics in England and Wales in 2003 approximately doubled the number of school spaces complying with current standards. Noise levels were also measured during 274 lessons to examine typical levels generated during teaching activities in secondary schools and to investigate the influence of acoustic design on working noise levels in the classroom. Comparison of unoccupied and occupied data showed that unoccupied acoustic conditions affect the noise levels occurring during lessons. They were also related to the time spent in disruption to the lessons (e.g., students talking or shouting) and so may also have an impact upon student behavior in the classroom.

Architectural Indoor Analysis: A Holistic Approach to Understand the Relation of Higher Education Classrooms and Academic Performance

“…Indoor noise and echo level evidenced an inverse relation between acoustic factor and academic performance, which confirms previous research [10][11][12][13][14]. However, its influence is lower in the practice room, where students work in small groups and communication does not need to reach a big audience.…”

“…An auditory feature, such as background music, has proved to promote collaborative behaviour and support good humour [9]. Also, noise, reverberation and distracting sounds interfere with communication, which may lead students to low information processing efficiency [10][11][12][13][14]. carried out with highly motivated students.…”

A Method to Estimate Students’ Exposure to Road Traffic Noise Events

“…providing an estimate of LAeq, [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17] h with a standard deviation of the error of ±0.5 dB and a coefficient of determination R 2 = 0.993 as shown in Figure 2c, where the prediction bands at the 95% confidence level are also plotted (blue lines). The median value of the error is 0.0 dB and for 98.5% of the observations in the dataset, the error is within the range ±1.5 dB.…”

“…Since the 1970s, many researchers have analyzed how chronic noise exposure affects the cognitive processes [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]. Researchers found that the disturbance caused by occasional noisy events such as overflying aircraft, pass-by trains, heavy trucks, motorcycles, street sweepers, or sirens may affect adults and children disproportionately compared to their contribution to the overall noise environment [10,11].…”

Planilha de triagem acústica da sala de aula: tradução e adaptação cultural para o Português Brasileiro

“…Evaluating the acoustic characteristics in classrooms for students with hearing impairment is of extreme importance, once in the school environment, the noise is not only an annoyance but also interferes with the performance of teaching activities (1,2) . The noise and its effects on the human organism have been arousing interest in various areas related to education and health (3) .…”