How long is a school bus?
13 meters 13 centimeters
Select the better estimate.
Measurements are written with both a number and a unit. The unit comes after the number. The unit shows what the number means.
Imagine being told that a pencil is 16 long. You might be thinking, 16 what? Is the pencil 16 centimeters long? 16 meters? 16 kilometers?
The number 16 on its own does not give you much information about the length of the pencil. That is because the units are missing.
Now look at the drawing of the pencil and the ruler. The ruler shows that the units are centimeters. So, the length of the pencil is 16 centimeters.
There are 100 centimeters in 1 meter. So, 1 centimeter is much shorter than 1 meter.
There are 1,000 meters in 1 kilometer. So, 1 meter is much shorter than 1 kilometer.
The better estimate for the length of a school bus is 13 meters.
13 centimeters is too short.