Once you know place value — that a two-digit number is just some tens and some ones — reading and writing those numbers becomes easy. The tens digit and the ones digit, side by side, give the number its name.

Take 34. The 3 means three tens (thirty) and the 4 means four ones:

Say the tens part first, then the ones part: thirty, then four — "thirty-four". Most two-digit names work exactly like this.

The tens words follow a tidy -ty pattern: twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, seventy, eighty, ninety. Each one is that many tens — 50 is "fifty", which is five tens.

The teens are the tricky ones. From 13 to 19 we don't say "ten-three" or "ten-four" — we say thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, and so on, with the ones part spoken first. And 11 and 12 have their own special names, "eleven" and "twelve". So the teens are worth learning by heart.

Press play. We build a two-digit number from its tens column and its ones column, then read its name aloud. Replay it: a different number is built each time, so you can practise naming each one.