The Measuring Scavenger Hunt

On Friday I had the kids do a measuring scavenger hunt. It's an idea I modified from one I received through the Math on the Level yahoo group. It had been a little while since we'd done a family math adventure so this came to mind and I put the idea in motion.

Part 1:

The first step was for me to measure some items around our school room (you could choose any place around your home) and record the length on a sheet of paper. I got a little crazy and went for 10 items. This would prove a little tough for I7, but E11 and R9 did just fine.

I put two blanks next to each measurement because I figured there was more than one item in the room that could have measured any particular value. The kids had to use rulers or yard sticks to measure items that they estimated would match a particular length. If it measured the same, they wrote down the object on the blank.

I used some metric and some English units and the kids had to determine which tool was best for the job. They had a good time being let loose with measuring tools.

Part 2:

Tomorrow we will work on some conversions. I7 can convert inches to feet or yards to feet and the older kids can do that and they will do some English to Metric conversions and vice versa.

This was a fun way to practice using rulers and to investigate with some estimation. Good math!