The sound environment of German preschools and preschool teachers' thoughts about sound generated by children

Noticeably, preschool children develop language and communication, so improvement of the preschool's sound environment is important. Currently, Japanese preschool facilities have experienced problems with noise. One cause is a lack of sound absorption. Moreover, the loudness of the generated sound is a second cause because preschool teachers generally believe that children's voices should not be muted. Therefore, improvement of sound environment is important and should be approached from both facility design and child behavior philosophy. In Germany, The German standard (DIN 18041) has necessitated the same level of sound absorption in the nursery as in elementary schools since 2004. Under the influence of these factors, architectural ideas, such as increasing the equivalent sound-absorption area, are generally seen at preschools (Kawai et al., 2018). Therefore, we have researched the sound environment at German preschools and preschool teachers' thoughts about the sound generated by children to identify ways to create a more acoustically comfortable learning environment. We observed three preschools and compared them to Japanese preschools. It was found that by implementing acoustic improvements in classroom design and increasing teacher awareness of appropriate sound environment, the noise levels tend to be lower. Consequently, it is believed that a proper acoustic environment improves overall awareness, leading to the creation of a better educational environment.