Lesson 2: Make Your Own Sound
This lesson is locked
The lessons open up once you have listened to the course introduction, Introduction: Daniel Kish on Echolocation. It is about five and a half minutes long, and it explains what echolocation is and where it came from — everything in this lesson builds on it.
About this lesson
Active echolocation starts with a good signal. Nathan teaches the tongue click the way it should be taught — entirely by feel, using the shape of your own mouth as the map. He covers two click techniques and explains which one he uses and why.
Listen for
- Finding the “rough part” of the roof of your mouth by saying the word “judge.”
- The front-middle click: tongue flat against that rough spot, light suction, released gently — bright, so it carries.
- The back-of-tongue click, found by saying “King Kong” — louder, but more effort.
- Why a light click beats a hard one: Nathan demonstrates both so you can hear the difference.
Try it yourself
- Say “judge” slowly a few times. Notice exactly where the tip of your tongue lands, and feel the rough ridge there.
- Slide your tongue slightly forward so the middle of the tongue touches that ridge, flat.
- Pull a little suction and release. Keep it light — a hard, wet snap is not the goal. You want a short, bright click.
- Practice in short sessions, a few minutes at a time. It can take a few days for the click to become easy and consistent — that is normal.
Transcript
Lightly edited for readability.
[Recording check.]
This is a lesson on how to make your own sound. In the past I’ve made recordings of myself making sound with stick clicks, clapping my hands, or clicking my tongue. The primary one I want you to use is the tongue click, and that’s probably the one that’s less intuitive to make — the average person wouldn’t be able to do it very well without help. So here’s what you do.
You know how the roof of your mouth is kind of a curve? Deeper into your mouth, it’s spoon-shaped. The rough part near the front is like the edge of the spoon — the edge pointed away from the handle. To make a click sound, you don’t want your tongue in the deepest part of that hollow. You want it flat against the rough part at the top of your mouth.
Say the word “judge.” Judge. Notice where the tip of your tongue lands. Feel that roughness. Now slide your tongue forward so that it’s more the middle of your tongue touching the roof of your mouth, and get some suction in. [Nathan demonstrates a few clicks.] Now — you don’t want to go too hard. [He demonstrates a hard, dull click.] That’s not good. You want to keep it light, keep it nice and flat. [A light, bright click.] That’s the sound you want.
Another way you can do this is by using the back of your tongue. Say the word “King Kong.” King Kong. Notice where the back of the tongue hits your mouth when you say that — right where you want it. Slide it up to that same rough spot; you might have to slide it up quite a bit. And again, don’t go too hard — that’s not a good sound. [He demonstrates.] Just that kind of sound. It takes a little more effort to click with the back of your tongue, but it is louder.
I personally use the front one, more in the middle of the tongue, because it’s brighter, and that allows it to carry. Same with claps — try to get those bright. A bright click lets you use it more subconsciously while you’re just walking around. You can hear things like: “oh, the door is this way, because I hear an opening when I click,” or “the wall is maybe thirty feet away, so I’ve got to keep going to reach it.” Active echolocation is the most effective way to get a lot of resolution — fidelity — in your sound, so you can hear exactly where you want to go and what you want to do.
So practice this a little bit. It might take a couple of tries to find exactly the right point, but you should be able to get it — and it will let you navigate your world a little better.