Hold up (or show a photo of) a bag of sugar and an apple. Take three hands-up answers, not open call-outs. Draw out the word heft — feeling the weight in your hand before any scale is used.

Demonstrate with a real scale at the front, holding each object up before you place it on. Read the needle aloud each time: 200, then 500, then 1 kilogram, then work the loaf fully.

• Emphasise choosing grams for light things and kilograms for heavy things.
• Say aloud that 1 kg is the same as 1,000 g.
• At the loaf, stop and work the between-marks method on the board with the real needle:
  1. Two big marks: 700 g and 800 g.
  2. Gap of 100 g split into 2 small steps → each step 50 g.
  3. Needle is 1 small step past 700.
  4. 700 + 50 = 750 g.
• Slip to watch: pupils guess 700 or 800, or add the wrong step size. Prompt which two marks, how many small steps, what is each step worth?
• If your scale’s small divisions differ (e.g. four steps of 25 g), keep the same four steps and change only the step value so the total still lands on 750 g.

Pupils measure at their desks with their own scales; circulate and catch alignment slips on the spot. The class reads aloud and you reconcile any disagreement as you circulate.

• Groups of four, one set of scales per group. Give each group the rubber, pencil case, book and schoolbag in turn (or circulate the objects).
• Insist on an estimate spoken before the weigh; the heft-then-check habit is the point of the lesson.
• Watch for pupils reading the wrong side of the needle or ignoring the small divisions; prompt which two marks is it between?
• Pupils record each estimate and reading on the Weighing Record Sheet so the two sit side by side.
• If a group has no scales, they order the four items lightest to heaviest by heft and check against your front-of-room reading.

Organisation: each group keeps its own scale and the objects circulate. Have one of each object and pass them from group to group in the same order, so every group weighs the water bottle first, the tin next, then the oranges, then the dictionary. Keep the pass-on rhythm brisk; the class confirms each reading aloud at the end.

• Have every group estimate before every weigh; do not let them skip straight to the scale.
• The tin and the oranges often read between marks, so pause the room: the needle is between marks, count the small divisions.
• Ask each group to order the four by measured weight and to name which ones are over 1 kg.
• Reconcile disagreements by re-reading together: which two big marks, then how many small divisions past.
• Fast finishers hunt for a ½ kg object; they wait quietly and watch the board rather than moving on alone.