AF1 M6 01 Numbers
AF1 M6 01 Numbers
AF1 M6 01 Numbers
M6 English
Vidal Ortega-Jiménez
1) 0 - 100:
NB: We write and before the tens. In American English, this is unusual.
e.g.: 135 one hundred and thirty-five.
307 three hundred and seven (but ‘three hundred seven’ in American English).
NB: We write a comma after ‘thousand’, ‘million’, ‘billion’, ‘trillion’ and so on.
Exception: We don’t write a comma before ‘and.’
e.g.: 1,105 one thousand, one hundred and five.
2,015 two thousand and fifteen.
2) 101 – 109:
NB: The words hundred, thousand and million can be used in the singular with a or one, but
not alone. A is more common in an informal style; one is used when we are speaking
more precisely.
e.g.: I want to live for a hundred years.
The journey took exactly one hundred days.
Note that a is only used with hundred, thousand, etc at the beginning of a number.
e.g. 146 a hundred and forty-six or one hundred and forty-six.
3,146 three thousand, one hundred and forty-six.
NB: Numbers from 1100 to 1900 can be spoken as ‘eleven hundred’ or as ‘one thousand,
one hundred’.
NB: We can also use the expressions dozen (12) and score (20).
e.g.: a dozen eggs, two score chairs.
3) FRACTIONS
More complex fractions are often expressed by using the word over.
e.g.: 317/509 three hundred and seventeen over five hundred and nine.
Expressions like ¾ hour, 7/10 mile are said three quarters of an hour, seven tenths of a mile.
4) DECIMALS
Decimal fractions are said with each figure separate. We use a full stop (called point), not a
comma, before the fraction.
e.g.: 0.5 (=1/2) nought point five, or point five (Am.E.: zero point five)
3.375 (=3+3/8) three point three seven five.
5) TELEPHONE NUMBERS
In phone numbers, we say each figure separately (they are pronounced figure by figure). 0 is
called like ‘o’ (or ‘oh’). When the same digit is repeated, this can be given as ‘double …’
(Instead of six six, two two, etc, British speakers usually say double six, etc).
e.g.: 307 – 4922 three o seven, four nine double two (Am.E.: … two two).
NB: Business firms often have a single telephone number from which callers may be
connected to a three- or four-digit internal extension (number).
e.g.: Oxford 56767 Ext 429; (202) 234-5678 (x301).
6) 0
The figure 0 is normally called nought in British English, and zero in American English.
When numbers are said figure by figure, 0 is often called ‘o’ (like the letter O)
e.g.: My account number is four one three two six o six nine.
Zero scores in team-games are usually called nil in British English (American zero). In tennis,
table-tennis and similar games, the word love is used. This is derived from the French l’oeuf,
meaning ‘the egg’, presumably because zero can be egg-shaped.
e.g.: Manchester three, Liverpool nil.
Five-love, your service.
7) MONEY
In sums which consist of pounds and pence together, the letter p is dropped from the writing,
and the word pence is usually dropped from the spoken form.
e.g.: £ 3.75 three pounds seventy-five.
When sums of money are used as adjectives, singular forms are usual.
e.g.: a five-pound note.
Examples of American usage: 1¢ = one cent, 23 ¢ or $0.23 twenty-three cents, $1.95 a dollar
ninety-five (or: one ninety-five).
NB: pennies = one-cent coins, nickels = five-cent coins, dimes = ten-cent coins, quarters =
twenty-five-cent coins, half-dollars = fifty-cent coins.
e.g.: Does this machine take dimes?
8) AREAS
In giving dimensions, we say, for example, that a room is twelve feet by fifteen feet (12’ x 15’)
or that a garden is thirty feet by forty-eight feet. A room twelve feet by twelve feet can be
called twelve feet square; the total area is 144 square feet (12’ x 12’). In an informal style,
foot is often used instead of feet in measurements.
e.g.: ‘How tall are you?’ – ‘Five foot eight.’
My bedroom is about eight foot by twelve.
NB: For weights (ounces, pounds…), length (inches, feet…)and liquid measure (pints,
gallons…), see a dictionary.
1) 1st - 1010th
2) DATES
NB: When dates are written, ‘the’, ‘of’, and often the ordinal ending (‘-th’, etc) are dropped.
Commas are possible before the number of the year.
e.g.: 1(st) January 2019.
September 28(th), 2022.
NB: When dates are expressed entirely in figures, Americans put the month before the day, e.g.:
8.6.16 means June the eighth in Britain, but August sixth in the United States.
NB: The numbers of years are usually said in 2 halves, but we normally say ‘the year two
thousand’ or ‘the year two thousand and nine.’
e.g.: 921 ‘nine twenty-one.’
1066 ‘ten (hundred and) sixty-six.’
1905 ‘nineteen hundred and five’ or ‘nineteen-o-five.’
1997 ‘nineteen ninety-seven (or nineteen hundred and ninety-seven).’
2009 ‘two thousand and nine.’
2018 ‘twenty eighteen’ or ‘two thousand and eighteen.’