Concept preview

What you will be able to do

1. 01State the SI base units for length, mass and time and use metric prefixes
2. 02Apply the significant-figure rules to measurements and calculations
3. 03Tell precision from accuracy and write a measurement with its uncertainty

Every law you'll meet in this course had to survive a measurement — so before anything else, we need to agree on how to measure and how honest to be about it. Two skills do all the heavy lifting: using the right units, and reporting the right number of digits. Nail these now and you'll never lose silly marks later.