This morning, our three-year-old was playing with this and had an accidental (and somewhat unpleasant) encounter with positional decimal numbering:
Mommy: Nice tower! Can you count the levels?
Audie: One, two, three, four ….
M: And the numbers are written on the side. See the numbers?
A: Five, six, seven ….
Daddy: Here, bud. Let me turn these around so we can see the numbers.
A: Eight, nine … one zero.
D: Actually, that’s ten. One and zero.
A: One and zero … is ten.
D: Yeah. A one and then a zero.
A: One plus zero equals ten!
D: No, no. That’s a little different than–
A: You said one and zero is TEN, Daddy!
D: Hang on. Listen while I explain–
A: ONE plus ZERO equals TEN, Daddy! ONE PLUS ZERO EQUALS TEN!
D: Little help, Mommy?
A: ONE PLUS ZERO EQUALS TEN!!! ONE PLUS ZERO EQUALS TEN!!!
D: Mommy? Where’d you go?