1.4 Ways of counting in local languages and different cultures  (Page 2/2)

RESEARCH: Ask your librarian to help you to find books with pictures and information about the Babylonians and their wedge-shaped writing.

3.1 Now see if you can draw a clay tablet with the following numbers in wedged-shaped writing: 1; 5; 10; 100; 1 000. Beneath each Babylonian number, write our number. (Use your researched information to do this.)

3.2 What was this wedge-shaped writing of the Babylonians called? Ask the librarian to help you to find the name in one of the books in the library.

4. The Romans

The Romans used a system that reminds one of the habit of counting on one’s fingers. One finger, for instance, represented number one. The V formed between the thumb and fingers of an open hand represented 5. To write their numbers, they used letters.

4.1 See if you can fill in the missing explanations of some Roman numbers:

The Romans made great use of “more than” and “less than”.

4.2 See if you can complete the following by using the previous table:

Certain letters represented larger numbers:

4.3 What number did the Roman “ C ” represent?

4.4 What number did the Roman “ M ” represent?

5. The Ancient Egyptians

The Egyptians used a system of picture writing or pictography. The Egyptians’ picture numbers looked like this:

5.1 Study it carefully. The Romans used V and X a great deal. What number did the Egyptians use to write many of their numbers?

• How did the Egyptians write 88? (Use the pictures above.)
• Now try to write 10 257 as the Egyptians would write it. (Maybe our number system is not so bad after all!)

Our numbers do not look at all like those of the Babylonians or the Romans or the Ancient Egyptians, so from whom did we get our numbers?

6. The Hindu-Arabic symbols

At one stage they looked like this:

We obtained our 1; 2; 3; 4; 5; 6; 7; 8; 9 from the Arabs. Our “0” came from the Hindu people in India, via the Arabs, who adopted it. How would we cope without the “0”! Imagine trying to write two thousand and ten in numbers without any “0s”.

MENTAL CALCULATIONS TEST 1

Do you know these number combinations smaller than 20?

MENTAL CALCULATIONS TEST 2

Revise combinations with larger numbers:

MENTAL CALCULATIONS TEST 3

Replace * with the correct relationship sign: =; ;<

MENTAL CALCULATIONS TEST 4.

1. Write down the missing numbers:

1.1 468 = …….. hundreds + …… tens + ……. units

1.2 2 350 = ….. thousands + …… hundreds +……… tens + 0 ………

1.3 8 642 = …… thousands + …….hundreds + …….tens + …..units

• 7 thousands + 9 hundreds + 6 tens + 1 unit = ……………………….
• 1 ten thousand = ………………………………

2. Write down the number that is:

2.1 one more than 999 ………………

2.2 five less than 101 ……………..

2.3. between 48 and 50 …………….

• greater than one thousand and less than one thousand and two
• ten fewer than 9 000

3. Write down the missing numbers:

• If 7 + 8 = 15, then 17 + 8 = ……… and 70 + 80 = …………….
• If 6 + 7 = 13, then 16 + 7 = ……… and 16 + 13 = ………..
• If 14 – 6 = 8, then 140 – 60 = ………. and 16 + 8 = ……….

4. Encircle the largest number: 1 010; 1 001; 1 100

5. What number is 99 more than 9 901? ………………

6. What is the value of the 3 in the number 3 456?…………….

7. What number is 2 less than 1 001?……………………..

Assessment

Memorandum

ACTIVITY – WAYS OF COUNTING

1. NUMBER NAMES

• ICS to supply numbers 1 to 10 inclusive in eleven official languages.
• Oral group work
• ICS to provide numbers 11 to 20 inclusive in eleven official languages.
• ICS to provide numbers: 100; 1 000 and 10 000 in eleven official languages.

Assignment

2.1 They had to count their animals and possessions.

2.2 Drawing

2.3 They put a stone in a bag for each animal or possession.

3. Babylonians

3.1 Drawing

3.2 cuneiform writing

4.1 one; double one; three

4.2 XI; XII; XIII; XIV; XV; XVI; XVII; XVIII; XIX; XX

4.3 100

4.4 1 000

5. The Ancient Egyptians

5.1 I

5.2 see diagram

5.3 see diagram

6 The Hindu-Arabic symbols

Discussion