Numbers 1-20 Tracing

1 one, 2 two, all the way to twenty

Each line carries the digit followed by its word, printed as a traceable model with a copy row underneath on four-line ruling.

Twenty lines is a long sheet, and the text is editable, so most people should cut it down.

Pairing the two is the whole point

A digit and its word are the same number in two notations, and children learn them separately unless somebody puts them side by side.

The written forms matter more than they appear to. Number words turn up constantly in word problems, in instructions, in stories and in cheques, and a child who can write 7 but not seven is stuck the moment a question is phrased in prose rather than in symbols.

Where the spellings go wrong

Predictably. In the same four places, every time.

Eight, which has a silent gh and no phonetic logic at all. Four and forty, where the u appears in one and vanishes in the other — this one catches out adults. Nine and ninety, which does the same thing with the e.

And the teens as a group: eleven and twelve follow no pattern whatsoever, and thirteen and fifteen are not spelled the way three and five would suggest.

Split it into three sheets

One to ten, then eleven to twenty, then the awkward ones from both.

Twenty lines in one sitting gets you careful handwriting for the first six and something rather different afterwards. The practice text field accepts any subset you like, and three short sheets spread across a week will teach considerably more than one long one attempted on Monday morning.

The teens are worth their own lesson

Not because of the spelling. Because of the language.

English says "thirteen" for 13 — three, then ten — but "twenty-one" for 21, ten first. Several languages, including Mandarin, are entirely regular here ("ten-three", "two-ten-one"), and children learning those tend to grasp place value earlier. English speakers have to memorise eleven through nineteen as exceptions before the pattern starts.

Knowing that explains why the teens are hard, which is worth telling a child who thinks they are the problem.

The controls

The text, font, trace style, rows per line, character boxes, ruling colour and line height. A4 or US Letter at 100%.

For the digits by themselves, printed larger and with no words attached, use the 0 to 9 sheet.