9.04 Measure and estimate volume
Are you ready?
Estimating volume is similar to estimating mass. Let's try this problem to practice estimating.
Choose the best estimate for the mass of a school bag.
$3$3 g
A$30$30 g
B$3$3 kg
C$30$30 kg
D
Learn
Volume can be measured in liters, which has a unit representation of L. For example, $5$5 L is five liters.
It is useful to know the volumes of some common containers to help you estimate new containers.
This video shows us how we can measure the volume of containers using a measuring beaker.
- Capacity is another word that we can use to describe how much liquid an object can hold.
- This video also introduces another unit for measuring volume, the milliliter (written as mL or ml). There are a thousand milliliters in one liter, so:
$1000$1000 mL $=$= $1$1 L
- You might notice that liter is spelled as 'liter' in the video. This is because 'liter' is the standard spelling used by the International System of Units.
Apply
question 1
This fish bowl was filled with water and then the water was poured into this measuring cup to find the fish bowl’s volume. What was the volume of water in the fish bowl?
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$\editable{}$ liters
question 2
Choose the best estimate for the volume of a water bottle.
$1$1 liter
A$10$10 liters
B$100$100 liters
C
If we have a measuring cup, we can fill a container, then pour it into a measuring cup to find out how much liquid it holds, its volume. We often use liters (L) to measure the volume of liquids.