What if you had the kids “trick or treat” for sound effects? Have a list of regular sounds to get, or even voices of some of the members of your ward, and they would go in costume to different houses to get the sounds. In exchange for the recording, they could leave a “treat” for the homeowners, like a bag with cookies, candies, etc. Each list would be different for each group, and wouldn’t need to be comprised of “spooky” or macabre sounds.
For instance:
Bro. Jones’ favorite knock-knock joke
A vacuum cleaner
A car horn
Sister Smith’s favorite Primary song (she can sing it, or the group can sing it for her)
etc.
Off the top of my head:
terrified scream
maniacal laughter
chop of axe
howling wolf (um, or dog 🙂
lightning (someone’s best imitation?)
thunder
cackling witch
slow stalking footsteps
and…
running footsteps
meowing cat (obviously black)
slamming door
shutters flapping in the breeze (deserted mansion idea)
slowly creaking door
Dracula’s voice
moaning of ghost
sharpening of knife on stone
tree branches brushing against window (this scares my kids)
“dead” silence for 13 seconds (I just made that up)
gasp
gunshot
fight
splash of something heavy falling into water
Bach’s Toccata on organ (you know – da da dum, da da da da dum dum)
and worst of all…
fingernails scratching down a chalkboard
If you have enough to go around, a video scavenger hunt would be a BLAST using the members of the ward doing things for the camera, as well as the groups on the hunt! ;o) Dare I say, it would be a “scream”?
