Attributes you can measure

Why this exists

One object has several separate things about it that can be measured: how long or tall it is, how heavy it is, and how much it holds. Each is its own question with its own words, and one does not decide another: a long scarf can be light, and a small stone can be heavy. Before a child can measure anything, the child has to know which thing is being measured, so these three days name each one and practice telling them apart.

Color and shape are true things about an object too, but they are not “how much” things, so they are not measured this way. Keep to the three above; comparing two objects side by side comes next, in Comparing two objects.

Day 1: How long and how tall

You need: a pencil, a ribbon or piece of string, a cereal box.

Hold up the pencil and say, “Tell me about this pencil.” Take every answer: yellow, pointy, for writing. Then say, “Here is one thing we can measure about it.” Have the child run a finger from the flat end to the tip. “That is how long it is. Its length goes all the way from one end to the other.”

Now stand the pencil on its flat end. “When it stands up, we say how tall it is.” Tall is the same idea as long, only standing up, from the bottom to the top. Ask, “Is yellow about how long it is?” No: yellow is its color, and painting it red would not make it longer or shorter.

Practice.

1. Show how long the ribbon is with your hands. Answer: one hand at each end; the length is the whole way from one end to the other.
2. Stand the cereal box up. Which word fits, long or tall? Answer: tall, because it is standing; its height goes from the bottom to the top.
3. Lay the box down on its side. Which word fits now? Answer: long; it is the same box, and the edge that went up now runs along the table.
4. “The pencil is pointy.” Does that tell how long it is? Answer: no, pointy tells its shape; long or short tells its length.
5. Show the length of your own arm. Answer: from the shoulder to the tips of the fingers.

Day 2: How heavy

You need: a shoebox with a lid, 4 or 5 wooden blocks, a bed pillow, a small jar of coins.

Have the child hold the empty shoebox flat on one hand. “Is it heavy or light?” Put in one block, then another, and ask each time, “Now?” How heavy something is, its weight, is what the hand feels pulling down. It is felt, not seen: you have to pick a thing up to know.

Next hand over the pillow. “It is big. Is it heavy?” No, the hand hardly feels it. Then the jar of coins: small, but it pulls on the hand. Big is not the same as heavy, and long is not the same as heavy. Weight is its own question.

Practice.

1. Hold one of your shoes. Is it heavy or light? Answer: either answer is fine once the child has held it; the word comes from what the hand feels, not from looking.
2. Put 3 blocks in the shoebox and close the lid. Did the box get heavier? Did it get taller? Answer: heavier, yes; taller, no. The weight changed and the height stayed the same.
3. Is the pillow big, heavy, or both? Answer: big but light.
4. Find something in the room that is small but heavy. Answer: anything small that pulls hard on the hand, such as a stapler or a roll of tape.
5. Which of these words tell about weight: long, heavy, tall, light? Answer: heavy and light.

Day 3: How much it holds, and many things about one object

You need: a plastic cup, a bowl of dry beans, a spoon, a lunch box.

Spoon beans into the cup until it is full. “The cup holds beans. How much it holds is another thing we can measure.” It is about the space inside the cup, not about how the cup feels in the hand.

Now ask three questions about the one cup. “How tall is it?” (Run a finger from bottom to top.) “Is it heavy or light?” (Hold it.) “How much does it hold?” (Look at the beans inside.) Three questions, three different answers, all about the same cup. Pour the beans back into the bowl and hold the cup again: it is lighter now, but it is just as tall, and it can still hold the same amount.

Practice. Is each question about how long or tall, how heavy, or how much it holds?

1. How much juice fits in the jug? Answer: how much it holds.
2. Can you lift the bag of apples? Answer: how heavy.
3. Will the rug reach across the doorway? Answer: how long.
4. Will the plant fit under the shelf? Answer: how tall.
5. Say three things you could measure about the lunch box. Answer: how long it is, how heavy it is (for example, light when empty), and how much it holds (for example, a sandwich and an apple).

Later on, children meet more things to measure, such as how long a song lasts or how much paper it takes to cover a table. The idea is the same: first say which thing you are measuring.

Exercises

1. Show the child the picture of the water bottle (or a real one). Ask, “What are three things about this bottle that we could measure?”
2. Ming says, “My scarf is very long, so it must be heavy.” Is she right? How could she find out?

Where this goes next

Once a child can say which thing is being measured, two objects can be held side by side to say which is longer or taller, as in Comparing two objects, or set on a balance to see which is heavier, as in Balancing to compare mass. How much a container holds leads to Volume does not change when it is poured. Later, length gets a number by laying units end to end in Measuring length, using the idea of a unit, and weight grows into Mass and weight.