Well the bean one does say ABOUT how long, guess that implies rounding
to the nearest inch. I see that a lot in my son's stuff in elementary
school. They learn to approximate. 
-- 

"Go for a Metric America"
Howard Ressel
Project Design Engineer, Region 4
(585) 272-3372


>>> On 5/17/2009 at 11:58 AM, in message
<4a05379f112843ebbf004f8956a9b...@notebook>, "Michael Payne"
<[email protected]> wrote:
> I picked up a scrap of paper on the street outside my home the other
day, 
> probably blew out of the garbage truck. Anyway it was a sheet filled
in by an 
> elementary age school kids on measurement. Shows how US kids have to
learn 2 
> systems and don't know either one.
> 
> Picture of Rake.
> a. Longer than 1 foot
> b. About 1 foot
> c. longer than 1 foot
> They got this one right.
> 
> Picture of single Carrot
> a. lighter than 1 kilogram
> b. About 1 kilogram
> c. Heavier than 1 kilogram
> 
> They marked about 1 kilogram. How is a kid in the US going to know
how much 
> a kilogram is? 
> 
> The interesting question to me was a picture of a green bean with an
inch 
> ruler marked in inches only with 3 graduations in between (for 1/4,
1/2 & 3/4 
> inches). The question was how many inches is the bean? To me it was
3-3/4 
> inches.
> 
> The kid marked down 3.3. The teacher put down 3.5 (in red) crossed
that out 
> and put 4. Kids see calculators, they count the graduations and that
becomes 
> a decimal, hence 3.3.
> 
> This is a good example of how and why the US does so poorly in math
and 
> science when compared to other nations.
> 
> I think I'll make a copy of the sheet and attach. Apologies for one
side 
> being upside down. You can have Adobe rotate it but it does the whole

> document. I'll also send it to my legislators. If everyone on this
list sent 
> this to their Congressional Representative, we might make a
difference!
> 
> Mike Payne
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