Writing Numbers

What Writing Numbers means

In this final grammar section I'm going to show you how you have to write the numbers when you're writing your essay so let's start off with numbers that are 10 and below so whenever you have a number that is between the numbers 0 and 9 you have to spell them out meaning that you have to actually write out the numbers in the English letters. So here's an example of a sentence in its correct version. It was found that four out of ten students failed. Note that here the number four is less than 10.

So for that reason we have to spell it out. However if you're talking about the number 10 then you have to write the number in the numeric format. OK so we only spelled the numbers that are between 0 and 9. Now let's look at another example.

How to use it

This time we have an incorrect sentence. This sentence reads she has four sisters aged six eight 13 and 17. Note that here we have some numbers that are spelled out in the English letters whereas other numbers are written in the numeric format. So that's why this sentence is incorrect because whenever we have a list it is best to write the numbers numerically.

So here's what the correct version of this list would look like all the numbers that are in the list. 6 8 13 and 17 have to be written down numerically whereas if a number is not in a list such as the number four over here then you have to spell it out in the English letters. Now let's talk about numbers that are 10 and above in this case you have to write the numbers that are 10 and above in numerals in the numeric format. OK the only exception to this rule is if these numbers appear at the start of a sentence.

So let's see some examples here. We have an example where the number 10 or above appears in the middle of a sentence note that the number 60 is above 10 and appearing in the middle of a sentence in this case we have to write this number in the numeric format. Let's see another example in this case the number 70 which is greater than 10 appears at the beginning of the sentence and therefore it has to be spelled out in the English letters. But if a number above 10 does not appear at the beginning of a sentence then we have to write it in the numeric format.

Now let's talk about how to write numbers when you're discussing time. Generally speaking we use numerals to discuss times of the day. Another point that I want to make about discussing times is that any of these formats for writing AM or PM are correct. So you can write AM or PM like this.

You can also write em and PM like this with the dots in between. like this in lowercase letters with the dots or in just lowercase letters without the dot. All of these are accepted formats for writing a.m. Now this is how we commonly describe time.

You can say it starts at 5:00 in the morning. So when you're talking about 5:00 o'clock you can spell it out in the English letters or you can say it starts at five thirty five am. In this case we've used the numeric format. You can also say it starts at 6:00 a.m.

Practice focus

We've used a numeric format here. You can say it starts at 4:00 p.m. where you only mentioned the number four. You don't have to add the colon and 0 0 to show 4 p.m.

You can just write the number 4. Now here's an uncommon example. It starts at four thirty five. We usually don't describe time in this way.

It's more natural to write thirty five in the numeric format. Now when it comes to writing the AM and PM all of these different formats are accepted. So feel free to use any of them another thing to notice is that in this example we haven't stated if we're talking about four thirty five a.m. Are we talking about the morning or are we talking about evening.

So make sure that you're clear about which time you're discussing. If you have to describe time in your writing essay now let's talk about writing dates. Dates are typically written in numerals meaning you have to write them in numeric format. Take note that when we're talking about dates we do not use the ordinal numbers ordinal numbers are numbers like first second third fourth fifth and so on.