Review of the Metric System
This lab is appropriate for upper level high school or 100-level Introductory Level Biology Undergraduates. This lab is licensed under Creative Commons Licenses.
You are a budding marine biologist. This summer you applied to go on a month-long expedition to explore local marine life on an island in the South Pacific. In the acceptance letter, you are reminded that all measurements made during this trip must be in metric units. As you research different units, you learn that the metric system is the standard system of measurement in most of the world and in all scientific fields.
Objectives
- Convert measurements between different metric units
- Determine what metric units to use when measuring mass, volume, temperature, and length
- Accurately measure mass, volume, and length
- Determine average body temperature, typical room temperature, and freezing and boiling points of water in degrees Celsius
- Collect data and construct graphical representations of data using a line graph
Materials
- cm ruler
- scale in grams
- pennies
- 25 mL graduated cylinder
- 2 mL volumetric pipet with regulator
- Erlenmyer flask
- 50 mL beaker
- 3 bottles of sand with different weights of sand
- thermometers in Celsius
- Hot plates with hot water
- Ice cubes
- hot plate or incubator set to 37 degrees C
- small plastic marine mammal figurine