This is another maths worksheet which looks at converting a larger metric unit to a smaller one, and is suitable for Year 5 children who have a good grasp of the metric system. Even so, don’t be surprised if children make mistakes with these, especially when multiplying by ten, one hundred or one thousand.
It is an interesting thought that we often think of the centimetre as being the standard unit of measurement of length, whilst for capacity and mass we use the units ml and grams. There are 1000 ml in a litre, 1000 grams in a kg and 1000 metres in a km, but only 100 cm in a metre.
Don’t forget a litre of water weighs a kg and can be contained exactly in a cube with sides of 10 cm. By the way, it really is about time we changed from miles to km and properly finished the changeover to metric. We pump petrol into our cars in litres, but its use is often still given in miles per gallon! Crazy!!