Big Ideas of Measurement

What is Measurement?

Measurement

Questions about “What’s the biggest?” get raised again and again in early childhood settings. If we want to know just how much bigger the “biggest” one is, we’ll get out a measuring tool: a ruler, a tape measure, or a measuring cup. Alternatively, we might avoid numbers altogether and settle for a direct comparison, lining the containers up tallest to shortest, or from that which holds the most sand to the one that holds the least. In each of these situations, we are engaging in measurement. Technically speaking, measurement is any process that produces a quantitative description of an attribute, such as length, circumference, weight, temperature, volume, or number. Measurement is an essentially mathematical procedure that we apply in many different contexts.

Copyright: Erikson Institute’s Early Math Collaborative. Reprinted from Big Ideas of Early Mathematics: What Teachers of Young Children Need to Know (2014), Pearson Education.

Big Ideas

● Quantifying a measurement helps us describe and compare more precisely.
● All measurement involves a “fair” comparison.
● Many different attributes can be measured, even when measuring a single object.

Interested in Book Suggestions?

Browse our favorite children’s books that explore Measurement.

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Volume of a Cube with Child 14

This second grader has limited use of structure and a partial understanding of cubic units. Focus on the Child videos are taken from one-on-one interviews with individual children. The interviews are designed to elicit evidence of children’s mathematical thinking.

Comparing Capacity at the Sand Table

What kind of “big” is it? This question is fundamental to all of measurement. Here, children explore the differences between tall and wide as they decide which bucket holds the most sand.

books about measurement strega nona inch by inch 636x363

4 Books About Measurement that Spur Children’s Thinking

Children measure all of the time, even if they’re not using rulers or numbers while doing so. There are many great children’s books about measurement that spur on children’s natural fascination with the subject.