Subject:
KS2 Maths
Topic: Choosing Correct
Measuring Equipment
Length of film:
04:04
Deidre Carson is a vet who works in a special hospital in Newmarket.
She works only with horses, while most vets work with a range of animals.
Description: Deidre knows that it’s important to use the right equipment
when measuring. If she has to weigh a horse, she uses large, heavy
scales that the horse can stand on. However when measuring out
medicine, she uses much smaller, more sensitive scales.
Discussion points:
1. Deidre is a special sort of vet: an equine vet. What does
this mean? What types of things does she do?
2. Why do you think the horses are weighed on that very
large platform?
3. What range of weights do you think the horse scales
can measure in? (pause at 2:04 to read the horse’s
weight).
4. Why does she measure the medicine on different
scales?
5. Could we use bathroom scales to measure the
medicine?
6. What other types of measurement do you think a horse
vet will need to take? (e.g. height, girth, volume of
medicine/liquid).
Suggested activities:
1. Collect a selection of scales: bathroom, kitchen,
classroom, scientific. Discuss the range of readings
each scales can measure. Choose the appropriate
scales to measure a range of objects (including each
other).
2. Set up an animal hospital in the classroom and
measure the height and weight of some soft toys (put
on some weighted collars to vary the weights children
must measure). Create some medicine recipes using
sugar and coloured water to measure and make up.
Extension activity:

Make a horse fact file of key measurements, or a
database of the measurements and race statistics of
famous racehorses.
Did you know…?
It takes five years to do a veterinary degree to become a vet. You
could also be a Veterinary Nurse or an Animal Care Assistant.
A typical riding horse weighs around 900 to 1,100 pounds. That’s
around 65 to 80 stones.
Contact: [email protected] Telephone: 0844 809 9395
Teacher’s notes:
Subject keywords:
scales, range, reading, balance,
digital, analogue, mass, weight:
kilogram (kg), half-kilogram, gram
(g), pound (lb), ounce (oz)
metre (m), centimetre (cm),
millimetre (mm), yard, feet, inches,
ruler, metre stick, tape measure,
capacity, litre (l ), half-litre,
centilitre (cl), millilitre (ml), pint,
gallon, container, measuring
111
cylinder
Job keywords:
Farrier – a person trained
professionally to tend to a horse’s
hooves.
Withers - a point at the bottom of a
horse’s neck. A horse’s height is
measured from the ground to the
withers.
Filly - a female foal.
Colt - a male foal.
Mare – a female horse over four
years old.
Stallion – a male horse that's over
four yrs.
© 2013 Yes Programme Ltd