Measurement

From November through December a group of seven children in second and third grade studied measurement. We first brainstormed some of the many ways we measure things – such as length, weight, capacity, temperature and time.

We started out studying length by asking what is length? How could we measure the length of the hallway? We decided to do this with our bodies and soon the discussion focused on how inaccurate this measure was because our bodies are different lengths. And so we started using a meter stick, a yard stick and a measuring tape.  We practiced these skills on our contract by completing a Meter Scavenger Hunt and an Inch/Foot Scavenger Hunt. Later we turned our attention to weight and weighed objects in grams, kilograms and pounds and ounces. We asked the question, which is bigger a gram or an ounce? When we explored capacity we compared containers of various sizes - pints, cups, quarts and gallons. By pouring sand into the containers we learned that 2 pints of sand fill 1 cup and 2 pints of sand fill 1 quart. Finally we looked at the thermometer and how we measure temperature in both Celsius and Fahrenheit by comparing the temperatures outside and inside the building.  And we searched for the hottest place in the school and the coldest.. We were good at that! Next year we will look at metric measurements of capacity.