Liquid Volume and Capacity Teaching Resources

Teach your students to measure liquid volume and capacity with printable worksheets and digital liquid measurement activities designed by teachers, for teachers! From volume word problems to worksheets that help students understand volume units of measurement, each printable and digital option in this in-depth collection of teaching resources has been created by a teacher to help students meet Common Core and state-level standards. Each resource has also undergone a rigorous review by the teachers on the Teach Starter team to ensure they’re student-ready — so you can cut your lesson planning time in half. New to teaching this part of the math curriculum? Our teacher team knows what it’s like to suddenly teach a brand-new concept, so we’ve put together a time-saving refresher!

How Do You Find the Volume of a Liquid?

The easiest way to measure the volume of a liquid is to fill a container such as a graduated cylinder or beaker. Students learn how to read the intervals on each instrument to determine the liquid volume. When studying this topic, students may practice reading measurement tools with single-unit intervals or those that progress by 10, 20, or 50.

What Units Are Used to Measure Volume?

Liquid volume is measured in the following units of measurement:

gallons
half gallons
quarts
pints
cups
fluid ounces

Liquid volume can also be measured in some units of measurement from the metric system, such as liters or milliliters.

Measuring Liquid Volume and Capacity in the Classroom

Are you looking for some ways to help your students calculate and estimate liquid volumes of objects? Perhaps you want to give your students real-life applications of when they may use capacity concepts. The teachers at Teach Starter have a few ideas to share to get your students' focused on measurement.

Set up different stations that require students to measure a variety of liquids with beakers and graduated cylinders. Encourage students to read each instrument and record the amount of liquid in each.
Work with your students to create a "Gallon Man." This is a fun math craft where students create a man whose legs, arms, and fingers represent capacity units. Your students will then have a visual representation to show that there are 4 quarts in a gallon, 2 pints in a quart, and so on.
Set up a game with your students where they create equivalent units. For this game, give each student a strip of paper with a different unit of capacity written on it (gallon, quart, pint, cup). On the teacher's cue, students must find other classmates and group together in equivalent pairs. For example, a student holding a "quart" piece of paper could match up with 4 students holding a "cup" piece of paper.