Matter is everywhere!  Both living and nonliving things are made up of this “stuff” otherwise known as matter.  Everything from the largest star in the universe to the smallest microorganism is made up of it.  Matter is anything that has mass and takes up space.  In fact, everything in existence can be categorized as either matter or energy.  During the first half of the year, we will be looking most closely at matter.

 In order to study matter scientifically, we must be able to  measure it.  Measuring things scientifically was a problem centuries ago because everybody measured things differently.  For instance, a foot in one kingdom may be entirely different than a foot in another kingdom.  Some kingdoms didn’t use the foot at all (except to walk of course!)  When scientific measurement became really important, a standard way of measuring things had to be invented.  Then, in the 1800s, the French created the metric system.  The metric system is a measurement system that is based on the number 10.  Today, almost the entire world uses the metric system to measure.  Of course, the good old U.S. of A. does not.  We Americans do use it to measure things scientifically however, which is why we are studying it in science class.  For the rest of your lifetime spent  in science classes, you will be measuring Length, Mass, Volume, Weight, Temperature, and Density with the metric system.

 

THE METRIC SYSTEM

Length

Everything in the metric system is based on the number 10.  Let’s begin our look at the metric system with Length. The basic unit in the metric system for length is the meter. Just like 100 cents makes up one dollar, 100 centimeters makes a meter. Ten centimeters make up one decimeter. Deci means ten, like in decade. Cent means one hundredth like century. Millimeters are smaller than centimeters.  It takes ten millimeters to make one centimeter. The thickness of a dime is about one millimeter. Milli means one thousandth, because there are 1000 millimeters in one meter.

 Kilometers, on the other hand are huge! Kilometers are meant to measure large distances, like from Lenox to Boston.  It takes one thousand meters to make one kilometer.  Kilo  means one thousand.  See how everything is in multiples of 10? Scientists use the same prefixes (like kilo) for everything they measure.  The tool we use to measure length is the meter stick.  Scientists use the metric system to measure other things such as mass, volume, and temperature.

 

 

 

 

Mass

Mass is a measure of the amount of matter or "stuff" in an object. Both living and nonliving things are made up of matter. Matter is anything that has mass and takes up space. You and all the things around you are made of matter.  The basic unit of mass is the gram.  One paper clip has the mass of about one gram.  If we took that paper clip and cut it into one thousand equal pieces, one piece would

be one milligram, because milli means one thousandth.  See how this is like length?  What is the mass of 1000 paper clips you ask?  The answer, of course, is one Kilogram, because 1000 grams equals one kilogram.  Can it really be this easy?  The tool use to measure the mass of an object is the Triple Beam Balance.

 

Weight

            A lot of people get the terms mass and weight confused.  Your weight depends on your mass, but your mass does not depend on your weight.  That is kind of confusing so lets try to explain it better. Mass of course, is how much matter is in you.  This stays relatively constant over time.  Weight measures the force of gravity pulling on that mass.  Still confused?  Well, remember that mass stays pretty much the same (unless you eat something or your arm falls off) no matter where you are.  If you have a mass of 50 kg in Lenox and you flew to the moon, your mass would remain 50 kg.  But lets say you weigh 80 pounds in Lenox.  If you took a trip to the moon and weighed yourself, you would find that your weight is now about 10 pounds!  Because the moon is much smaller than earth, it has a lot less gravity.  Because the moon has less gravity, it doesn’t pull on you as hard, so you wind up weighing less even though you haven’t changed the amount of “you” at all. If you flew to Jupiter, which is a HUGE planet, your weight would all of a sudden skyrocket to over 200 pounds!  You won’t look fatter, but you would feel heavier because Jupiter has so much gravity that it pulls on you harder.  Remember, mass is how much matter is in you and weight is how hard gravity pulls on you.  Your weight depends on your location, but mass does not. The basic unit of weight in the metric system is the Newton.  The tool use to weigh objects is the spring scale.

Volume

                Volume is the amount of space that an object takes up.  Objects that take up a lot of room have a lot of volume, whereas objects that are tiny have small volumes.  All matter takes up space, so all matter has volume.  There are a few ways to determine volume.

·         A regular object is a solid that has easily measurable sides such as a cube.  To find the volume of a cube, all you have to do is multiply Length x Width x Height.  You typically do this in centimeters.  Here’s an example….

 

  Each side of this cube is 5 cm.  To find the volume, all you have to do is multiple length x width x height.  This is 5 cm x 5 cm x 5 cm.  This equal 125 .  Don’t forget to multiply the units! cm x cm x cm = cm3.  So the answer is 125 cm3  .

 

 

 

 

 

 

·         To find the volume of a liquid, all you have to do is use a graduated cylinder.  The basic unit of volume is the liter.  Most of you have 2 liter bottles of soda at home.  A graduated cylinder measures liquids in increments of milliliters.  How many milliliters are in one liter you ask?  One thousand of course, but let’s get back to volume.

 

The picture to the left shows a graduated cylinder.  The picture to the right shows a close up view of the graduated cylinder.  According to the cylinder, there is 73 milliliters of liquid in the container.

 

 

 

 

 

 

·         How do you find the volume of an irregular object like a screw?  Since you cannot measure the length x width x height of a screw accurately, you must do this differently.  All you have to do is add some liquid to the graduated cylinder up to ……hmmmm let’s say 50 ml.  Drop the screw in and WHOA, the reading on the graduate changes.  Let’s say it reads 55 ml this time.  What happened is the bolt took up the space that some of the water was taking up.  The water became displaced and had no where to go but up!  The volume of water displaced just happens to be the exact volume of the screw, so all you have to do is figure out how much water was displaced.  That’s easy.  The reading was at 50 and now it is at 55.  That means that 5 ml of water was displaced.  That means that the screw has a volume of 5 ml.  And by the way, because scientists like to make things easy, one milliliter just happens to be the same as one cubic centimeter (cm3).  Aren’t scientists nice???

 

 

Temperature

                The last metric measurement we will worry about for this test is temperature.  Temperature measures the motion of molecules believe it or not.  The faster the molecules in an object are moving, the hotter the object is.  We will learn about molecules later.  The important thing to remember here is that temperature is measured by scientist in degrees Celsius.  Americans use the Fahrenheit scale to measure temperature, but that uses strange numbers.  Water freezes at 32 degrees and boils at 212 degrees.  Weird!  Once again, very nice scientists from the past decided to make things easier. They created the Celsius scale using base 10.  In the Celsius scale, water freezes at exactly 0 degrees.  That’s easier to remember than 32.  Water boils at 100 degrees, much easier to remember than 212.

 

 

 

 

Hope this helps.  Good luck!!!