Natural language processing

I've been searching for a couple of weeks for a way to handle dimensional analysis with my juniors. It was clear from the first presentation of the word "units" that using that particular vocabulary was going to be an uphill battle. For the past couple of weeks, I've been struggling to find a way to explain what units are, and why they're useful.

Today, in a moment of synchronicity during first period, I happened to say "So, what thing does that number represent? What label can we put on it?" And, viola: the terminology is found: "Label" as a proxy/synonym for "unit". Worked well all day-- suddenly, students were comfortable with using the (ahem) "label" for every number they put on the paper.

Later, of course, I'll have to spiral back through and explain that "label" isn't really Proper Mathematical Terminology, and that Real Mathematicians And Scientists use the word "unit", instead. But at that point, the "what it is and why it's useful" part will be handled, and it'll just be a little mini-lesson in linguistics (unit, from "one", as in "one of these types of measures.")