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Why are numbers so hard? | ||
Tags: Number System | Difficulty | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| hokusai77 Triglot Senior Member Italy Joined 7150 days ago 212 posts - 217 votes  1 sounds Speaks: Italian*, FrenchB1, EnglishC1 Studies: GermanB1, Japanese | Message 9 of 51 11 May 2005 at 2:52am | IP Logged | ||
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The same system of Korean (and Chinese) counters applies to Japanese, as well. But I think the most difficult part of Japanese numbers are those above 10,000. In fact, 10,000 in Japanese is "ichi-man" (1 "man"), which is the base for further numbers. So, 100,000 becomes 10 "man", 1,000,000 becomes 100 "man", and so on.
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| administrator Hexaglot Forum Admin Switzerland FXcuisine.com Joined 7374 days ago 3094 posts - 2987 votes 12 sounds Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian Personal Language Map | Message 10 of 51 11 May 2005 at 3:15am | IP Logged | ||
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In India the word 'lakh' is used for the number 100,000.
For instance, an Indian speaking English could very well say, I sell my house in Long Beach for 8 lakhs dollars. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| victor Tetraglot Moderator United States Joined 7316 days ago 1098 posts - 1056 votes 6 sounds Speaks: Cantonese*, English, FrenchC1, Mandarin Studies: Spanish Personal Language Map | Message 11 of 51 11 May 2005 at 7:58pm | IP Logged | ||
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Another challenge in Japanese is that when they are combined with the "counting words" mentioned by Aradaschir, their pronunciation changes. To say "one person", ichi meaning one, becomes hitori. That is because the second is based on the original Japanese counting system.
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| maserati Newbie Taiwan Joined 6833 days ago 3 posts - 3 votes Speaks: EnglishB2 | Message 12 of 51 14 March 2011 at 4:46am | IP Logged | ||
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I think we are on the same boat, though I spend all my monthly budget, I wouldn't learn the number well and in contraty, I infected a harsh malady from learning in an eroded language school abroad.
The situation I met is from a bureaucratic education system, someone told me only a premature student in my age may learn it well. For anyone of us, learning number in any language is unstoppable, is this image conceivable? Who know. Edited by meramarina on 15 March 2011 at 12:03am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jdmoncada Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 5032 days ago 470 posts - 741 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Finnish Studies: Russian, Japanese | Message 13 of 51 14 March 2011 at 5:48am | IP Logged | ||
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My problem with numbers was that reading the Arabic representations (1, 2, 3, 346, etc and so on) would throw my out of the language I was using and back into English. For the longest time, I always heard those in my mental voice in English.
I had to make conscious effort into disconnecting the idea of the symbol (for example, 7) and the actual quantity ///// //. I was helped in that by playing lots of games with playing cards. Now I have no problems in doing that in Finnish, and little error in Spanish. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tibbles Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5189 days ago 245 posts - 422 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Korean | Message 14 of 51 14 March 2011 at 6:48am | IP Logged | ||
Not too odd if you consider that Danish, like French, is basing those names on multiples of 20 instead of 10. The number for tres (60) comes from shortening tresindstyve (3 * 20). I thought the oddest part of the Danish numbering was that you say 21 as "one and twenty", etc. English has that problem with the teens, but Danish extends it all the way up to 99. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| zekecoma Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5342 days ago 561 posts - 655 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 15 of 51 14 March 2011 at 8:07am | IP Logged | ||
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I have the same issue with in German. It just gets very confusing when you get into the
1000+ imho. After 20, you start doing 1 and 20, 2 and 20, 3 and 20, 4 and 20, etc. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5007 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 16 of 51 14 March 2011 at 11:31am | IP Logged | ||
How different is Swiss-French from the French used in France? I haven't studied much different kinds of French yet. Do they count the same way as English or Spanish does? I'd say numbers and counting are difficult because maths is a kind of foreign language by itself. A language based on quite abstract vocabulary and complicated grammar :-D. For me the main trouble is not remembering what is 97 in the foreign language but for exemple 97+115, because I spend time translating the thought in my first language, counting and translating it back. Anyone has experience with studying maths in foreign language? :-) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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