Ruler of the Ruler (A Measuring Activity)

To have a little fun with measuring, I turned my son into the Ruler of the Ruler, complete with a crown too!

To start our activity, we read Brian P. Cleary’s book How Long or How Wide?: A Measuring Guide (it was my inspiration). If you’re a regular reader than just skip this part; you’ve already heard me gush about Cleary’s books.

This book provided my son some great background on millimeters, inches, centimeters, feet, and yards. After reading the book front to back, my son wanted to go back through and even asked if we could replicate a “12 inches = 1 foot and 3 feet = 1 yard” graphic as an activity. (Whoa, now my son is coming up with his own ideas for activities? My job as a parent just got easier!)

Before I handed him the ruler, I gave him a piece of cardstock to make his Ruler of the Ruler crown.

Download a PDF of the ruler crown here.
Print on heavyweight cardstock, cut along the middle line, and staple or tape together to fit.

When I finally pulled him away from the book, I gave him a ruler and recording sheet. (Click on the picture below to download a PDF.)

His job was to find six things shorter than 12 inches and six things longer than 12 inches. He measured each of them.

Then, he wrote the objects and their measurements on the worksheet to form six 'greater than' math sentences (for example, the table at 56 inches is greater than the book that is only 7 inches).