YORK, Pa. — A math lesson this morning at York’s Smith Middle School involved sixth-graders and more than 5,000 rulers.

It took students about two hours to line up 5,280 rulers end to end outside the school to demonstrate how many feet are in a mile. It wasn’t the straightest line, but the point was made.

“This is like a once-in-a-lifetime experience doing this ruler stuff. And it’s something that we’re probably not going to forget,” said sixth-grader Jose Vasquez.

“It’s a good way to teach students, and it is a fun way. We always do a lot of fun stuff in class,” said sixth-grader Breyonna Small.

York Mayor John Brenner helped students put down the final ruler.

The students got the rulers from within the York City School Districts. Parents and others also volunteered to donate some.

York, PA right up the road from me.

Not too straight is it?
A good way to teach students what? How not to make a straight line? That each ruler is a foot which is why it took 5,280 rulers.
Two hours, huh.
Did the students learn where the length of a mile came from?
Or how Britain modified it to fit their needs? Or how to convert a mile to metric since pretty much the rest of the world doesn’t use miles?

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 18th, 2006 at 3:59 pm and is filed under Science. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.