April 30, 2007 - Rockville, MD /PRNewswire/ — The Buds, two kid-friendly cartoon characters created by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) to promote safe usage of personal audio technology by the nation's young, released today Turn Down the Volume, a rap song with a safe listening message that encourages children to turn down the volume and invites the public to visit the Buds' Web site, www.listentoyourbuds.org.
To download the Buds' song from their site, visitors can go to the home page of the Buds' site. Visitors will also find the lyrics to the song, which has the following refrain: Loud music can be dangerous/ so exercise your brain with us/ and sing this refrain with us/ TURN DOWN THE VOLUME.
Along with the song, the Buds' site has special sections where parents and educators can find helpful information for teaching young children about safe usage.
"The timing of the Buds is superb," ASHA 2007 President Noma Anderson observes. "On the occasion of May's Better Hearing and Speech Month, they have released a very relevant and enjoyable teaching tool for getting the word about safe usage out to the young."
ASHA owns all rights to Turn Down the Volume, which was composed by Rhythm, Rhyme, Results (www.educationalrap.com) in Cambridge, MA. The company specializes in creating and producing educational rap songs for academic and social purposes.
"We encourage our members and non members, children, professionals, and the public to visit www.listentoyourbuds.org," ASHA's Anderson says. "We believe they'll enjoy what they hear. We wish them all a safe—and musical—Better Hearing and Speech Month."
The Turn Down the Volume rap song is the latest addition to "America: Tuned in Today...But Tuned Out Tomorrow?", an ASHA public education campaign about the potential risk of hearing loss from unsafe usage of personal audio technology.
To date, key campaign elements have included www.listentoyourbuds.org, an interactive bilingual Web site for young children, parents, and educators; national television and radio PSAs that warn about hearing loss risk from misuse of personal audio technology; two national polls on usage habits and attitudes and subsequent video news packages; and a presentation at the first ever national conference on noise-induced hearing loss in children.
In addition, throughout May, ASHA will be running sponsorship messages on National Public Radio (NPR) aimed at raising awareness about communication disorders and the professionals who can help.
ASHA is the national professional, scientific, and credentialing association for more than 127,000 audiologists, speech-language pathologists, and speech, language, and hearing scientists.
