Uno, dos, uno dos tres quatro . . .

[equusregia]

My head is buzzing with numbers, having set out to clarify for Gillian the base 12 explanation in the "Little Twelvetoes" video from Schoolhouse Rock. This segued into an explanation of binary, took a slight detour into how a symbolic representation of a thing (e.g. written numbers and letters) is not the thing itself, and then wound up with a

Comments

all bases are base 10

[khedron]

My head is buzzing with numbers, having set out to clarify for Gillian the base 12 explanation in the "Little Twelvetoes" video from Schoolhouse Rock. This segued into an explanation of binary, took a slight detour into how a symbolic representation of a thing (e.g. written numbers and letters) is not the thing itself, and then wound up with a history of human methods of counting, from hatchmarks (one-to-one correlation) through Roman numerals (hybrid between numbers and hatchmarks) and back to numbers. And a reminder of why numbers are also called "digits."

Wow, that's fantastic. I never thought about Roman numerals being a stepping stone, but you're totally right.

Kids and the learning process are awesome, and I mean that word in its original sense. I'm in awe of the human race right now.

:-)