Hey all! I was recently helping one of my students with conversions within the metric system. I showed him this mnemonic device that helped him to know how to move the decimal around when converting from one unit to another. For example, he was trying to find out how many centimeters are in 7 meters. We
You can also multiply or divide by multiples of ten, but this way seems easier to remember, and gives a visual, too.
The general idea is this: 1. Start with the letter of the unit you are given. 2.Count the jumps you make to the left or the right towards the new unit you are trying to find. 3. Move the decimal of your original number the same number of spaces and in the same direction as you did on the letters.
Here is a quick graphic for this lesson, but check out the following video for the whole explanation!
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