Worksheet Grade 2 Math

Elm Grove's Water Tower: A Grade 2 Bar Graph and Pipe-Length Worksheet

Grade 2 students graph four days of water tower pumping data, compare bar heights, and add and subtract pipe lengths in inches for the town of Elm Grove.

Grade: Grade 2
Subject: Math
Material: Worksheet
Time: 30 min
Prep: No prep
Materials: Ruler (optional, for item 9 discussion), Crayons or colored pencils (optional, for drawing the bar graph), Grid paper (optional, for drawing the bar graph)

Standards

2.MD.D.10 Common Core Math

Draw a picture graph and a bar graph (with single-unit scale) to represent a data set with up to four categories. Solve simple put-together, take-apart, and compare problems using information presented in a bar graph.

How this material aligns: Item 1 asks students to draw a bar graph of four days of pumping data, and items 2 through 6 solve compare and put-together problems using that graph.

All materials for 2.MD.D.10 →

2.MD.A.1 Common Core Math

Measure the length of an object by selecting and using appropriate tools such as rulers, yardsticks, meter sticks, and measuring tapes.

How this material aligns: Item 9 asks students to choose the appropriate measuring tool for a pipe from a set of options, the tool-selection skill this standard names directly.

All materials for 2.MD.A.1 →

2.MD.B.5 Common Core Math

Use addition and subtraction within 100 to solve word problems involving lengths that are given in the same units, e.g., by using drawings (such as drawings of rulers) and equations with a symbol for the unknown number to represent the problem.

How this material aligns: Items 7 and 8 use addition and subtraction to solve word problems about joining and comparing two pipe lengths given in the same unit, inches.

All materials for 2.MD.B.5 →

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This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely, without attribution. Updated 2026-07-15.

Objectives

Students will draw and interpret a bar graph showing up to four categories of data.
Students will use addition and subtraction within 100 to solve problems about the graph and about pipe lengths.
Students will choose an appropriate tool for measuring the length of an object.

Vocabulary

Water tower: A water tower is a big tank raised high above town that stores drinking water. Its height is what pushes water through the pipes, keeping the pressure steady even when the power goes out.

Teacher overview

The small town of Elm Grove keeps its drinking water in a water tower, a tall tank that a pump fills a little at a time. Workers called distribution system operators keep records of how much water moves through the tower and its pipes each day. This worksheet uses four days of Elm Grove's pumping record to practice reading and drawing a bar graph, then uses two of the tower's pipe sections to practice adding and subtracting lengths measured in inches.

Elm Grove's Water Tower: A Grade 2 Bar Graph and Pipe-Length Worksheet — Grade 2 Math

Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Worksheet

Elm Grove's water tower record for four days. Each number stands for that many thousand gallons, so 15 means 15 thousand gallons.

Day	Thousands of gallons pumped
Monday	15
Tuesday	30
Wednesday	10
Thursday	20

Draw a bar graph of the table above. Label each bar with its day. Make each bar the correct height.
Which day did the pump add the most gallons?
Which day did the pump add the fewest gallons?
How many more thousand gallons were pumped on Tuesday than on Wednesday?
How many thousand gallons were pumped on Monday and Thursday combined?
How many thousand gallons were pumped over all four days?
A worker joins two pipes end to end. Pipe A is 14 inches long. Pipe B is 9 inches long. How long are both pipes together?
How much longer is Pipe A than Pipe B?
A worker needs to measure a new pipe. Of these three tools, a ruler, a yardstick, or a bathroom scale, one of them would not work at all. Which one, and why?
In one sentence, tell why a daily record like this bar graph helps the town's water workers.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Answer Key

Answer: A bar graph with four bars matching the table: Monday 15, Tuesday 30, Wednesday 10, Thursday 20, each bar labeled with its day. Accept any graph with bars at the correct heights and clear labels.
Answer: Tuesday. It has the tallest bar, at 30 thousand gallons.
Answer: Wednesday. It has the shortest bar, at 10 thousand gallons.
Answer: 20 thousand gallons. 30 minus 10 equals 20.
Answer: 35 thousand gallons. 15 plus 20 equals 35.
Answer: 75 thousand gallons. 15 plus 30 plus 10 plus 20 equals 75.
Answer: 23 inches. 14 plus 9 equals 23.
Answer: 5 inches. 14 minus 9 equals 5.
Answer: A ruler or a yardstick could work depending on how long the pipe is, but a bathroom scale would not work at all, because a scale measures how heavy something is, not how long it is.
Answer: Answers will vary; accept any answer noting that a bar graph lets a worker see at a glance which days used more or less water, compare days quickly, or notice an unusual day without rereading a long list of numbers.

Differentiation

Support (below grade level)

Provide a grid with the axis already labeled and numbered by fives, so students only need to draw the bars to the correct height rather than build the scale themselves. Allow students to use counters or a number line for the addition and subtraction items.

Extension (above grade level)

Ask students to write their own word problem using the water tower table, one that another student could solve using addition or subtraction, and to include the answer on the back of the page.

ELL supports

Pre-teach "tower," "pipe," and "pump" using a simple labeled diagram of a water tower with pipes running to a house. Allow item 10 to be answered orally to a partner before writing, and provide sentence starters such as "A bar graph helps workers because ___."