Numbers

[starlein26]

So my son is learning (re-learning) numbers and for 11 he says one-teen, and for 15 he says five-teen...any other kids do that? He also says 2 or 4 for 24 I can't get him to see them together...

[MtnCanary]

He's 3, right? Totally normal for this age. Heck, my 5 1/2 year old is in Kindy this year, and we're just doing 1 through 10. Understanding the concept of the quantity of the numbers is more important than being able to rote count or recognize the numbers written down. My dd still gets a bit sketchy on the teens - they aren't named consistently with the rest of the number system. I wouldn't worry about it, and would just work on making numbers fun.

Kristin
mom to dd (5 1/2), ds (2 1/2) and #3 due in June

[IncaMama]

yup, normal. in fact, it's also extremely common for kids to skip 15 entirely when counting from 1-20. :

[glendora]

He's recognizing that there are "rules" to incremental numbers. Smart cookie!

[starlein26]

Originally Posted by glendora

He's recognizing that there are "rules" to incremental numbers. Smart cookie!

He even says five-tee for fifty...

Thanks for thinking that this is smart...here I thought it was stupid...

[glendora]

No problem. When you think about it, though, he's using deductive reasoning. It takes much more sense to think, "numbers are systematic," and then to apply what you've detected as the system, than to just memorize a sequence. If the ten numbers after 10 seem to all end in "teen" and they all look the same-12, 13, 14, then technically, eleven should be "oneteen." All that mistake means is that he understands what "oneteen" means--he conceptually understands 11, and so all he's got left is to learn all the language exception.

It's like when they say "go-ed" instead of "went." They've already figured out that past tense is usually a verb with "-ed" at the end. They're right: the past tense of go should be "goed." It's just that english is weird, and they just don't know all they crazy exceptions, yet.

[hottmama]

My son is 4 and can't even count to 10. Although if you ask, "what comes after 7?" or hold up a number of fingers, he can answer correctly, and he has a pretty good idea of what "50" or "100" or "thousands" means.