When did metric start to be taught in British schools?

[DelayRepay]

I buy pasta by the kg. I buy meat by the kg. I buy carrot by the kg. I buy rice by the kg. I buy juice by the L. I can't remember all the different fractions between the imperial units and can only memorise 1 lb = 454 g (1/2 lb = 227 g; 1/4 lb = 113 g) and 1 pint = 568 mL. I will need to use a calculator if different units are used.

I buy pasta and rice by the packet and juice by the carton. A bag of pasta is normally 500g, but if it was 1lb I would still buy the one bag. I guess if I was really bothered I could find one of those refill shops that sells it loose so I could buy 1.1lb.

The thing is though, this does provide more opportunities for 'Shrinkflation'. Your 500g pack of pasta becomes 1lb but the price stays the same. And it will make it more difficult to compare prices if some shops display prices in metric and some in imperial. I don't object to retailers using whatever pack size they prefer, but I do hope we retain the approach of quoting price per 100g or whatever on the price tag.

Shrinkflation - examples?

"Shrinkflation" is the business practice where pack sizes of items (often food items) shrink in size or quantity, yet the selling price remains the same, or even increases! An example: Packs of McVities (Jaffa Cakes) Cake Bars came, until recently, in packs of eight and were being sold for £1...

www.railforums.co.uk

I worked for Safeway when they switched from lbs/Oz at the deli counter. We were all given credit-card sized conversion guides which were handed out to customers. If I was asked for a quarter of smoked ham, or a pound of cheddar at the deli counter, I was capable of dispensing the metric equivalent. Even then, you were judging quantities by eye, so it was always going to be just under or just over the specified quantity.

My dear dad would never use the deli counter because he was convinced that they deliberately provided 'just over' in order to increase their takings. But how many people actually want exactly a quarter of ham, as opposed to (say) five slices of ham? I guess if you're making a pie or something then you might need a particular weight, but most of my ham goes in sandwiches!

My dad was a bus conductor at the time of decimalisation and he always said it was an excuse to increase fares as they were all rounded up. He said he had endless complaints from passengers who thought they were being over-charged. This was his biggest objection to being in the EU - he worried that one day we might join the Euro and Stagecoach would use the opportunity to raise the price of his Megarider.

 

[Killingworth]

On otherwise boring continental motorways I used to keep alert by mentally converting distances from kilometres to miles, divide by 8 multiply by 5. Then for more amusement calculate mpg at different speeds. Modern car instruments make it too easy.

Spotted this sign on a nearby site, the traditional railway distances in miles and chains but position using what 3 words. Postal codes were too confusing for railway sites and grid references too complicated.

 

[adc82140]

I use both metric and imperial, and I'm in my 40s. I was taught metric at school in the 80s, but my parents always used imperial at home. Therefore if anyone asks I'm 5 foot 11 tall and weigh 90kg. That really confuses everyone. I will ask for a foot long ruler, then use it to measure in cm. I will tell people my car does about 50 miles to the gallon, then say it has a 60 litre fuel tank.

 

[Killingworth]

My dad was a bus conductor at the time of decimalisation and he always said it was an excuse to increase fares as they were all rounded up. He said he had endless complaints from passengers who thought they were being over-charged. This was his biggest objection to being in the EU - he worried that one day we might join the Euro and Stagecoach would use the opportunity to raise the price of his Megarider.

It's certainly true that prices were adjusted upwards far more often than down, but that was only for items priced in pence, less than 1/-, 5p in decimal money. (6d converted to 2.5p and half penny coins were still widely used back then.) These were the very smallest items so the overall effect of decimalisation on prices was quite modest, eg. an item priced at 19/11 to seem less than £1 might be repriced at 99p, a very small reduction.

However inflation was rising quite rapidly in the late 1960s and early 1970s with the biggest increases up to 25% in the 1973-82 period. It was natural for some to blame the change to decimal currency for boosting inflation.

 

[cjmillsnun]

Nobody is suggesting people go back to imperial by default, merely removing the legal prohibition on advertising some things using those units.

*only in imperial measures.

Which suggests going back to imperial by default

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

In science classes we were told that there were two 'flavours' of metric - cgs (centimetre-gram-second) and mks (metre-kilogram-second). The mks flavour evolved to become the Système International of units.
We used the cgs system for our calculations in maths, physics and chemistry. Anyone remember the erg? An erg being the amount of work done by a force of one dyne exerted for a distance of one centimetre.
This was about 1958/9 as I went to Uni in 1962 and there it was all mks.
The world around us was of course still Imperial - it was many years later before I saw my first bathroom scales graduated in kilograms on sale in England...

That's pretty much my experience too.
The "imperial world" was essentially the British Commonwealth, which almost entirely went with metric (and decimal coinage based on 10 shillings as the main unit) before we did.
It doesn't seem to have done the Australians, South Africans and Canadians much harm.
The USA is a significant outlier, but even its imperial-like measures are subtly different.
They emphasise the foot and pound rather than our yard and stone, and the volume measures (gallon etc) are different.
In the US I still can't visualise "1000 feet" at road junctions, or a quart of milk when it is 4/5 of the imperial measure.

 

[JonasB]

Seems bonkers to me; 1 inch is exactly 2.54cm and everything else follows naturally from that.
So a mile is exactly 1.609344km, I don't have a problem with that! It was defined to be this value on 1 July 1959 according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mile

It worked in Sweden. Until 1889 the mil was defined as 18000 aln, or 10688.54 m. When the old systemet of measurements was replaced with the international standard the mil was replaced by the nymil (new mil) that was 10 km, although no one uses the word nymil today, everyone just calls it a mil. And I don't think anyone cares that it became 6% shorter in 1889.

 

[DerekC]

In science classes we were told that there were two 'flavours' of metric - cgs (centimetre-gram-second) and mks (metre-kilogram-second). The mks flavour evolved to become the Système International of units.

We used the cgs system for our calculations in maths, physics and chemistry. Anyone remember the erg? An erg being the amount of work done by a force of one dyne exerted for a distance of one centimetre.

This was about 1958/9 as I went to Uni in 1962 and there it was all mks.

The world around us was of course still Imperial - it was many years later before I saw my first bathroom scales graduated in kilograms on sale in England...

That was pretty much my experience too, about five years later. At my first school (as far as I remember) it was all imperial and learning rods poles and perches and stuff by rote. Then (in another primary school) introduction to centimetres and grams. Then as @coppercapped says - cgs and then mks (SI). The difference between cgs and SI was more confusing than switching from imperial to metric.

In the 70s I once acted as manager for training a group of Chinese engineers in the UK. Before travelling they had been on a special course in China to learn imperial units and were a bit put out to discover that they had wasted their time!

As you say, unlikely, I would say, so unlikely that it can be discounted as a plausible possibility. There is no way that - say - Sainsburys or Tesco - are going to willingly choose to add to their own costs and simultaneously annoy a lot of their customers by swapping to imperial only. If any retail businesses go imperial-only, I would expect it would most likely be a few market traders and small independent retailers in less cosmopolitan parts of the country (red wall areas, perhaps) where their customers are mainly older people who would appreciate being able to buy in imperial, and who feel uncomfortable with metric. (And to be clear, in any areas where that's what people want, I don't see any issues with allowing it, because letting people do what they want as far as practical is, in principle, a good thing).

It strikes me that the current situation is perfectly satisfactory - if a trader wants to display in imperial as well as metric because it suits some customers that's fine, but people who want to shop around have a standard measure for comparison. This is quite obviously a Johnson dead cat and it's best to just hold your nose and pass on by!

 

[nw1]

I was taught maths and science entirely in metric.

Geography would often refer to "acres" or "miles" though. I am 35.

I was at school in the late 70s and 80s and was fully taught metric, though I was used to the idea of feet for elevation (many road atlases still used them in the early 80s, though the OS went over to metres much earlier) and miles (still used to this day).

I still have no idea what an acre is, though. Not really sure about a hectare, either, as it doesn't make its SI base unit clear. I prefer "square" units (whether they be square metres, square kilometres or square miles) as you can more easily visualise them based on their base unit.

 

[swt_passenger]

I still have no idea what an acre is, though.

I don’t think you can go far wrong with an acre being roughly the size of a children‘s sized football pitch. Say just a bit bigger than about 90 yards x 50 yards. It’s accurate size is derived from an area 220 x 22 yards, 1 furlong x 1 chain, or 4840 sq yds.

Not really sure about a hectare, either, as it doesn't make its SI base unit clear. I prefer "square" units (whether they be square metres, square kilometres or square miles) as you can more easily visualise them based on their base unit.

A Hectare is an area of 10000 sq metres, possibly best visualised as a square of side 100m. So there’s 100 hectare to the square kilometre. I see the hectare as a bit of an optional extra for land measurement in view of the vast difference between sq metre and square kilometre. You can also visualise a hectare as a very large and wide football pitch, say 120 x 80m.

(Additionally, Hectare derives from the prefix “Hect” meaning 100 times, and the rarely used or heard term “are”, that being an area of 100 sq m. So 100x100 sq m.)

 

[Mcr Warrior]

I was at school in the late 70s and 80s and was fully taught metric, though I was used to the idea of feet for elevation (many road atlases still used them in the early 80s, though the OS went over to metres much earlier) and miles (still used to this day).

Not that much earlier. The Ordnance Survey switched from 1:63,560 1:63,360 scale maps (one inch to the mile scale) to 1:50,000, in or around 1974.

 

[jfollows]

Not that much earlier. The Ordnance Survey switched from 1:63,560 scale maps (one inch to the mile scale) to 1:50,000, in or around 1974.

1:63,360 is 1 inch to the mile, I think.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

1:63,360 is 1 inch to the mile, I think.

You're right. A small number of sources that I looked up (ahead of posting) mis-quoted the scale as 1:63,560.

 

[swt_passenger]

Not that much earlier. The Ordnance Survey switched from 1:63,560 1:63,360 scale maps (one inch to the mile scale) to 1:50,000, in or around 1974.

Did they initially label them as “1 and 1/4 inch” to the mile maps? Or was that just an explanation of the perceived improvement?

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Did they initially label them as “1 and 1/4 inch” to the mile maps? Or was that just an explanation of the perceived improvement?

Don't remember that. But it's entirely possible. Would have made the scale 1:50,688 if I've got the maths correct this time.

 

[nw1]

Not that much earlier. The Ordnance Survey switched from 1:63,560 1:63,360 scale maps (one inch to the mile scale) to 1:50,000, in or around 1974.

I guess that "seemed" a long time ago at the time, even though it was perhaps only 7 or 8 years.

 

[Ediswan]

Did they initially label them as “1 and 1/4 inch” to the mile maps? Or was that just an explanation of the perceived improvement?

My recollection is that "1 1/4 inch to the mile" was publicised (not labelled) as an approximation in order to provide a "same units" comparison against the previous "1 inch to the mile". Hardly anybody knew the older maps as 1:63,360, so had no direct comparison against 1:50,000.

There were also numerous changes to the cartography. During the changeover, you didn't need to find the marked scale to tell which you were looking at.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

There were also numerous changes to the cartography. During the changeover, you didn't need to find the marked scale to tell which you were looking at.

Didn't the OS have some weird contour intervals on their mid 1970's 1:50,000 'First Series' maps (i.e. immediately post metrication)?

 

[swt_passenger]

Didn't the OS have some weird contour intervals on their mid 1970's 1:50,000 'First Series' maps (i.e. immediately post metrication)?

Did the first series use the 50ft interval with metric conversions, but the later series were fully redrawn contours with 10m intervals, or something like that?

BTW, back to the earlier question, I just dug a pile of paper maps out and realised many of my 1990s 1:50000 Landranger maps do still also have 1 ¼“ to the mile on the front cover, as do the 1:25000 have 2 ½” to the mile shown on the cover next to the metric scale as well.

Hidden in plain sight…

 

[Ediswan]

Did the first series use the 50ft interval with metric conversions, but the later series were fully redrawn contours with 10m intervals, or something like that?

Sounds familiar, but I can't find an example.

BTW, back to the earlier question, I just dug a pile of paper maps out and realised many of my 1990s 1:50000 Landranger maps do still also have 1 ¼“ to the mile on the front cover

Likewise. I was wrong in saying that this was never marked. Looks like it was added for the Second Series.
First Series was marked "1:50 000 First Series".
Second Series covered all the options "1 1/4 in to 1 mile - 2cm to 1km 1:50 000"

 

[Mcr Warrior]

First Series was marked "1:50 000 First Series".
Second Series covered all the options "1 1/4 in to 1 mile - 2cm to 1km 1:50 000"

Inside cover of a "1:50 000 First Series" map for a location in West Wales, published 1974, states that "This map is one of the sheets of a new series at a scale of 1:50 000 (approximately 1 1/4 inches to 1 mile) which the Ordnance Survey has published to replace the popular one-inch maps of Great Britain."

Contour intervals look to have been 15 metres, 30 metres, 46 metres, 61 metres, 76 metres, 91 metres, 107 metres, 122 metres (and so on) above sea level, so may well have been directly converted from the old 50 foot contours without the lines being redrawn.

 

[E27007]

Commenced secondary school in 1966 age 11 years, SI metric was fully established, in physics g = 9.8 metres/ second squared for acceleration due to gravity, never had to deal with such things as poundals
In the case of old imperial text books in use, the teaching staff had organised a programme for volunteers to hand amend the books substituting the equivalent in SI for the imperial numbers and notations

 

[eMeS]

I moved on to the Science Side at school in about 1953, and from then, I got used to centigrade for temperatures, - all temperatrures. Eventually, the TV weather presenters caught on as well, and I was a happy bunny. Recently, I've noticed with the same weather presenters Fahrenheit is making a comeback - help! (And, I think the presenters are old enough to be my daughters!) (I know the red-top tabloids love Fahrenheit for a heat wave - it allows them to say it's going to be "90"! )

 

[Dai Corner]

I moved on to the Science Side at school in about 1953, and from then, I got used to centigrade for temperatures, - all temperatrures. Eventually, the TV weather presenters caught on as well, and I was a happy bunny. Recently, I've noticed with the same weather presenters Fahrenheit is making a comeback - help! (And, I think the presenters are old enough to be my daughters!) (I know the red-top tabloids love Fahrenheit for a heat wave - it allows them to say it's going to be "90"! )

Influence from the American TV channels?

 

[Mojo]

Influence from the American TV channels?

Can’t say I’ve noticed it personally, although despite the stereotype of Americans having little knowledge of world outside the USA, on my visits there speaking with locals about the weather almost everyone when discussing the temperature seems almost embarrassed talking in Fahrenheit to me as a British person because I think they know it’s gibberish to the rest of the world.

 

[Typhoon]

Commenced secondary school in 1966 age 11 years, SI metric was fully established, in physics g = 9.8 metres/ second squared for acceleration due to gravity, never had to deal with such things as poundals
In the case of old imperial text books in use, the teaching staff had organised a programme for volunteers to hand amend the books substituting the equivalent in SI for the imperial numbers and notations

A disadvantage of metric! I would have been studying for GCSEs in '66. It was definitely 32 feet per second squared, a much easier number to do the sums with. Poundal means nothing to me and I don't think it ever did. Mind you, it was physics and I spent 3 years not understanding it. one year understanding it, passed 'O' level a year early (presumably on the strength of being able to do sums, knowing Newton's Laws and being able to apply them - we did calculus in maths - and being able to draw ray diagrams. I spent the last year playing with Nuffield equipment to make it look like we were learning something.

 

[Dai Corner]

Although I have A Level physics (studied 1976-8 in SI units) I still can't visualise a square second. Perhaps that's covered in degree courses?

 

[eMeS]

Although I have A Level physics (studied 1976-8 in SI units) I still can't visualise a square second. Perhaps that's covered in degree courses?

I was taught "sec per sec" (square seconds) in 3rd forms. It went with us measuring the acceleration due to gravity using an inclined plane, and a weight descending the plane. I aslo remember dropping weights from a height and comparing how they fell. Great stuff!

 

[Phil56]

I was taught metric only from when I started primary school in around 1969 (as far as I can remember). But I still think in imperial. I can look at a piece of wood and my immediate thought is a 2"x2" or 6' long. Fence panels, say, are still sold in feet dimensions. I still go to the DIY store to look for 2" screws! I look at someone and think "they're just over 6' tall". I weigh myself in stones and pounds. All that is simply from "life" and nothing to do with my education. I can pick up a bag of sweets in a shop and think "a quarter" or "half a pound", never 225g!

I actually think my O and A levels (Maths and Physics in particular) were harder because measurements were in metric, which was something I couldn't relate to despite being formally "taught" it for years!

 

[Typhoon]

Although I have A Level physics (studied 1976-8 in SI units) I still can't visualise a square second. Perhaps that's covered in degree courses?

That is because we have got into a lazy way of writing it - it really should be (metres-per-second) per second. Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity (measured in metres-per-second) with respect to time (measured in seconds).

Conjecture: I suppose you could have miles per hour per minute (?) with speed of a vehicle measured in miles per hour, but acceleration measured over a smaller period of time as acceleration (even average acceleration) is unlikely to make sense over a long time period.