Acoustic microscopy has attracted much interest recently as potential nondestructive evaluation technique for detecting and sizing defects of surface and sub-surface. Also acoustic emission testing method has been developed for detecting microcracks which is more than 30${mu}m$ in length quantitatively on ceramics. In the present paper, acoustic emission during the four point bending test in hot-pressed sintered $Si_3N_4$ specimen which was stressed by thermal shock, has been measured by high sensitive sensing system. The surface and sub-surface cracks were detected by scanning acoustic micrscope of 800 MHz and conventional ultrasonic testing in C-scope image. The purpose was to investigate the location and size of cracks by SAM and AE technique, whose experimental data demonstrate good for detecting microcracks.