inchworm

measurement, unit price

Inchworm,  Inchworm

You may be familiar with the song with the above title from the 1952 movie Hans Christian Anderson.  In the song, the inchworm, measuring the marigold is assured that he will “certainly go far.”  At Math Made Easy, we agree, since measuring is one of the basic math literacy skills we all need to deal with on a regular basis.

Familiarity with the different types of measurements we use every day – length, area, volume, mass, weight, time, energy – is critical to understanding the way we live and to saving money and energy.  How many of us know what the Energy Efficiency Rating on an electrical appliance means?  Or how to compare unit prices for two different units of measurement?  Or how to calculate the cost of a service – like ours – by the minute or by the hour when it is given in either measurement?

Children today – and probably for the last two generations of children – have been able to avoid learning to tell time on an analog clock, the kind that has two or more hands.  Many of us have met people – adults and children- who are unable to tell what time it is without an LED display.  

To make matters more complicated, the United States generally uses U.S. Customary Units while the rest of the world uses metric, or International Standard (SI), units.  In medical environments, which reflect the scientific stand use of SI units, we are nevertheless using SI units in our generally Customary U.S. Unit country!  It appears that we need to convert to metric measurement from our American measurement if we want to understand units used in hospitals and doctors’ offices.

When we buy appliances, do we know how a BTU, British Thermal Unit, is defined?  Or how to calculate a kilowatt hour?  Or – even more importantly – what those measurements mean for us in terms of saving money and energy?

Measurement is one of the most challenging and interesting areas of mathematics one can study without an extensive background in theory.  Let us help you to understand this vital subject in our tutoring sessions and in further messages from us.

measurement, unit price