Place value tells us that each digit is worth ten times the one to its right: hundreds, tens, ones. Decimals just keep that same pattern going past the ones — we mark where the whole part ends with a decimal point, and the digits after it count smaller and smaller pieces of one.

The first digit after the point is tenths — one of ten equal slices of a whole, which is exactly a fraction:

So 0.3 means three of those slices — three tenths:

We can see a tenth as a step on a number line. Cut the gap from 0 to 1 into ten equal steps; each little step is one tenth. Press play, then replay it: each time the marker hops along to a new tenth and reads the decimal aloud.

Take one more step right and each tenth splits into ten again. The second digit after the point is hundredths — one of a hundred equal pieces of a whole:

Reading left to right, the places after the point go tenths, then hundredths. So 0.27 is two tenths and seven hundredths:

Khan Academy introduces decimals here: