Rulers are difficult to read if you don't know what all those little marks between the 1 and 2 are representing. Teach halves, quarters and eighths while the children make their own rulers with construction paper. Laminate the paper with a roll of inexpensive, clear contact paper. Select several items for the kids to measure and mark down their results. Set a timer; once it goes off, let the kids know how accurate they were by revealing the correct measurement for each item. Explain why measuring correctly is so important for building and in other jobs.
Teach kids about height and length by letting them measure each other. Give each child an outline of the human body. Let them guess the measurements of the body parts, such as leg and arm length, head circumference and height. Next, allow the kids to measure each other and record their findings. Check to see how close they were on the estimates. Kids learn important critical thinking skills when they compare estimations to actual measured information.
As the children become more comfortable estimating length and height, present them with a list of measurements coinciding with various objects in the room. Ask them to list what object they feel the measurement represents. Allow the kids to measure different items to find the objects on your list. You can either let the kids work separately or divide them into groups. You may want to choose more than one object for each dimension so the kids have more choices when measuring.
Interactive measurement games include teaching about volume, such as how many quarts are in a gallon or how many cups are in a pint. These types of measurements are easily taught with simple cooking experiences. For instance, allow the kids to measure ingredients to make a granola mix. Not only do they learn about measuring, but they get a treat for all their hard work. Introduce critical thinking skills into the learning experience by having the kids determine how many gallons of juice the class needs to allow each child one cup of drink.