1) 900cl= ______l, 2) 700cl= ________l, 3) 800ml= _________cl

Question

Please help me understand the metric conversions of the above math problems. I have tried to figure this out using the conversion form I have, but no luck. Can you help me with this? Thank you

Answer 1

Here is a visual aid that might help.

 

 

 

                                                     Liter

                                                     Gram

                                                     Meter

 

K               h                 da              base             d             c             m 

Kilo            hector         deca           unit              deci         centi        milli

10³                  10²                    10¹             10⁰              10^-1             10^-2              10^-3

  |                |                 |                 |                 |              |              |

             So cl would be located here   ↑

Base units are things like gram, liter, meter.

 

Think of each tick mark on the line above as a stepping stone. If I needed to get from the cl stone to the liter stone I would jump two places to the left. That is what you will do with your decimal in the number they give you. So for 900 cl (the decimal is to the right of the second zero). To get to liter I move two places to the left so I move my decimal two places to the left which gives me 9 liters.

 

You can do this with any base unit and you can move left or right.

                 

Another example: If I had 1 meter and I wanted to know how many millimeters (mm) that was, I would jump from meter in the center of my line and go three spaces to the right. So I would move my decimal three places to the right and put in zeros to hold the place. 1 meter becomes 1000 millimeters.

Answer 2

Hi Laldaya;

1) 900 cl=___l

(900 cl)[(1 liter)/(100 cl)]

The units of centiliters is in both the numerator and denominator.  It cancels...

(900 cl)[(1 liter)/(100 cl)]

(900)[(1 liter)/(100)]

The only unit remaining is liters.  This is what we want...

(900/100) liters

9 liters

 

2) 700 cl=____l

(700 cl)[(1 liter)/(100 cl)]

cl is in the numerator and denominator.  It cancels...

(700)[(1 liter)/100]

(700/100) liter

7 liters

 

3) 800 ml=_____cl

(800 ml)[(1 cl)/(10 ml)]

ml is in the numerator and denominator.  It cancels...

(800)[(1 cl)/10]

(800/10) cl

80 cl