• ATM article from 2007 - Discover units with the eyes of a mathematician Here, Judit Kerekes, describes a series of interdisciplinary investigation activities which, she found, helped ‘students deepen their understanding of the fundamental ideas of measurement’.
  
  
• ATM article from 2002 - Who is doing the thinking?  Here, Ken Saunders recounts an activity that he led with Y2 children when, in a role-play situation, the children were told that all the rulers in the world had been destroyed and they must make some rulers. This ‘real-life’ problem stimulates a lot of discussion and questions and children develop understanding about fundamental principles relating to measuring instruments.

(ATM articles are free for members and are available for a small charge for non-members)

• Weigh to go This is an NRICH article that looks at the history of measurement and suggests that this should be used as ‘a spring board for cross-curricular study’.

Activity set A

You could ask groups of four children to collect five items from around the classroom and order them according to criteria of their own. They could share their ideas and then order according to a different criterion and then another. Encourage them to think about ordering according to, for example, length or height and weight.

Again, working within a group of four, you could give each child a piece of plasticine and ask them to roll it to make the longest worm that they can in a minute. They then order their ‘worms’ from shortest to longest. The shortest worm could become a (non-standard) unit and children can estimate and measure how many worms long different things are. They could then measure the shortest to the nearest centimetre and use this to estimate the lengths of the others. Once they have estimated the ’worms’ they measure them to see how close their estimates were.

You could give the children a selection of containers, measuring jugs for one or two litres and access to water. They could then find out each container’s capacity to the nearest litre.

You could play a ‘Just a minute’ type game so that the children become familiar with the vocabulary related to measurement. Write a selection of words on pieces of card and then say the meaning for each one. The children need to work out the word you are describing. Time them to see how quickly they guess all the words. Do they get quicker the more they practise?

Activity set B

To help the children recognise different coins and their values, you could give them a random number of up to 100 pennies. Ask them to count these into piles of 10 and when they have exchange each pile for a 10 pence coin. For any coins left over they exchange these for two pence and/or five pence coins.

You could focus on exchanging pennies for two and five piece coins and also 10 pence coins for 20 pence, 50 pence and one pound coins.

You might be interested in giving the children 15 pennies and the task ‘Money Bags’ from Nrich

Activity set C

You could ask the children to draw a picture to show something that they do in the morning, then in the afternoon and evening. They cut these out and give them to a friend to put in the right order.

You could display a weekly time table of activities that the children do and ask questions from it, for example:

• What do we do on Wednesday morning?
• What day comes two days after Monday?
• What day comes before Thursday

You could display a calendar and ask the children to write their name in that month in which their birthday occurs. Again, ask questions from this, such as:

• Who has a birthday between June and September?
• Which month is two months after ‘Julie’s’ birthday?

You could play the ‘Just a minute’ type game as described in Activity set A but purely related to the vocabulary of time, for example, before and after, next, first, today, yesterday, tomorrow, morning, afternoon and evening, o’clock, half past, hands, day, week, month, year.

Activity set D

Give each child a paper plate and let them use it to make their own clock with moving hands. Firstly, they write the hour numbers around the outside. Cut out hands of the right lengths so that the minute hand will touch the outside of the ‘clock face’ and the hour hand will touch the hour numbers. Help the children to attach these using a paper fastener. Call out different o’clock and half past times for the children to find on their clocks.

You could attach some of the clocks that they children made to a board which is at an appropriate height. Write times on post it notes and position one beside each clock. The children can then work with a partner to move the hands on the clocks into the correct positions for the times.

Examples of what children should be able to do, in relation to each (boxed) Programme of Study statement

compare, describe and solve practical problems for:

• lengths and heights (e.g. long/short, longer/shorter, tall/short, double/half)
• mass or weight (e.g. heavy/light, heavier than, lighter than)
• capacity/volume (full/empty, more than, less than, quarter)
• time (quicker, slower, earlier, later)

• Use their experience of standard units to make realistic estimates, answering questions such as:
  • Is the table taller or shorter than a metre?
  • Is this doll taller or shorter than one of the class rulers?
  • Does this bottle hold more or less than the litre jug?
  • Which of these things do you think will weigh less than a kilogram?

measure and begin to record the following:

• lengths and heights
• mass/weight
• capacity and volume
• time (hours, minutes, seconds)

• Use standard units to measure and compare objects. For example, they place metre sticks end-to-end to find out how much wider the hall is than the classroom. They use a litre jug to measure how much more the washing-up bowl holds than the cola bottle.

recognise and know the value of different denominations of coins and notes

• Distinguish coins by sorting them and start to understand their value. They begin to recognise that some coins have a greater value than others, and will buy more: for example, 2p is worth more than 1p; 5p is worth more than 2p; £2 is worth more than £1. They play money games and collect 1p or 2p coins to the value of 10p and begin to count up ‘how much this is altogether’. They extend their activities in the classroom shop, paying for items that cost 1p, 3p, 5p, 7p or 9p using only 2p coins, and receiving the appropriate amount of change in 1p coins. They use coins to help them to respond to questions such as:
  • Michael had £5. He spent £3. How much did he have left?
  • Rosie had a 10p coin. She spent 3p. How much change did she get?
  • How much altogether is 1p and 2p and 5p?
  • Sunita spent 5p and 6p on toffees. What did she pay altogether?
  • Chews cost 2p each. How much do three chews cost?
  • An apple costs 12p. Which two coins would pay for it? What combinations of 3 coins would pay for it?

sequence events in chronological order using language such as: before and after, next, first, today, yesterday, tomorrow, morning, afternoon and evening

• Continue to develop the concept of time in terms of time passing and sequencing events in familiar story or day-to-day routines.
  • They use terms such as morning, afternoon and evening, yesterday and tomorrow.
  • They learn to order the days of the week and learn that weekend days are Saturday and Sunday.
  • They listen to stories and rhymes about time, such as The Very Hungry Caterpillar or The Bad-Tempered Ladybird by Eric Carle, Monster Monday by Susanna Gretz or Hard Boiled Legs by Michael Rosen and Quentin Blake.

recognise and use language relating to dates, including days of the week, weeks, months and years

• order the months of the year and make a 12-page classroom calendar with pictures of each month, writing significant events underneath, such as Divali, Pancake Day or Midsummer’s Day, or the dates of their birthdays.

tell the time to the hour and half past the hour and draw the hands on a clock face to show these times

• Read time to the hour and half hour on a clock with hands and recognise half past the hour in day-to-day routines. They use time lines or clocks to help them to respond to questions such as:
  • It’s half past seven. What time will it be in four hours’ time? What time was it two hours ago?
  • John went to the park at 9 o’clock. He left at half past eleven. How long was he at the park?

Judging the Show Jumping is a video of children in the EYFS using stop watches to time children competing in their own human gymkhana show jumping event.