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Worksheet Grade 4 Math

Elmwood Water Plant Tour: A Grade 4 Unit Conversion Table

A grade 4 math worksheet set at the fictional Elmwood water plant, where students build a two-column table to convert liters, hours, and kilograms into smaller units.

Objectives

  1. Students will convert liters to milliliters, hours to minutes, and kilograms to grams within one system.
  2. Students will record measurement equivalents in a two-column table.

Vocabulary

Key words: milliliter, convert, gram, kilogram

Teacher overview

The fictional Elmwood water plant cleans drinking water for a small town, and a fourth-grade class is touring it. This worksheet uses that visit to practice conversions within one measurement system: liters to milliliters (mL), hours to minutes, minutes to seconds, and kilograms to grams. Item 6 asks students to record equivalents in a two-column table, which is exactly what 4.MD.A.1 names. A common error at this grade is dividing instead of multiplying when moving from a larger unit to a smaller one, so watch for students who make the number smaller instead of larger.

Elmwood Water Plant Tour: A Grade 4 Unit Conversion Table — Grade 4 Math
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Worksheet

Elmwood cleans water for the town. Here are the facts you need. One liter is 1,000 mL. One hour is 60 minutes. One minute is 60 seconds. One kilogram is 1,000 grams. Use these facts for every item.

  1. A jar holds 3 liters of water. How many mL is that?

  2. A drum holds 5 liters. How many mL is that?

  3. The plant runs for 4 hours. How many minutes is that?

  4. One test takes 2 minutes. How many seconds is that?

  5. A bag of sand weighs 7 kilograms. How many grams is that?

  6. Fill in the table. Change each liter amount to mL.

    Liters Milliliters
    1
    2
    6
    10

  7. A pump runs for 3 hours. How many minutes is that?

  8. A worker stays for 6 hours. How many minutes is that?

  9. Tell how you change liters to mL. Use words.

  10. A tank holds 9 liters. Is that more or less than 8,000 mL? Tell how you know.

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

Answer Key
  1. Answer: 3,000 mL. One liter is 1,000 mL, so 3 × 1,000 = 3,000 mL.
  2. Answer: 5,000 mL. 5 × 1,000 = 5,000 mL.
  3. Answer: 240 minutes. One hour is 60 minutes, so 4 × 60 = 240 minutes.
  4. Answer: 120 seconds. One minute is 60 seconds, so 2 × 60 = 120 seconds.
  5. Answer: 7,000 grams. One kilogram is 1,000 grams, so 7 × 1,000 = 7,000 grams.
  6. Answer: 1,000; 2,000; 6,000; 10,000 mL. Multiply each liter amount by 1,000: 1 → 1,000; 2 → 2,000; 6 → 6,000; 10 → 10,000.
  7. Answer: 180 minutes. 3 × 60 = 180 minutes.
  8. Answer: 360 minutes. 6 × 60 = 360 minutes.
  9. Answer: Multiply the number of liters by 1,000. A student may say they add three zeros because each liter is 1,000 mL.
  10. Answer: More. 9 liters is 9 × 1,000 = 9,000 mL, and 9,000 is greater than 8,000, so the tank holds more.

Differentiation

Support

Give students a printed strip with the four conversion facts and a matching arrow rule for each ("liters to mL: multiply by 1,000"). Let them start with the table in item 6 so the repeated pattern is visible before the single-answer items. Allow a multiplication chart for the times-by-1,000 steps.

Extension

Ask students to write two new conversion problems of their own, one using kilograms to grams and one using hours to seconds, then trade with a partner and check each other's work by multiplying twice.

ELL supports

Pair each unit word with a small picture: a jug for liters, a clock for hours and minutes, and a weight for kilograms. Provide a sentence frame for item 9: "To change liters to mL, I ___ by ___ because one liter is ___ mL."