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PROTOCOLO NUMBERS

CARDINAL AND ORDINAL NUMBERS

The cardinal numbers (one, two, three, etc.) are adjectives referring to quantity, and the ordinal
numbers (first, second, third, etc.) refer to distribution.

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CARDINAL NUMBERS are normally used when you:

• count things: I have two brothers. There are thirty-one days in January.
• give your age: I am thirty-three years old. My sister is twenty-seven years old.
• give your telephone number: Our phone number is two-six-three, three-eight-four-seven.
(481-2240)
• give years: She was born in nineteen seventy-five (1975). America was discovered in
fourteen ninety-two.

Instead of saying One hundred, you can say A hundred.

e.g. (127) one hundred and twenty-seven OR (127) a hundred and twenty-seven.
The same rule applies for one thousand (a thousand) and one million (a million)

Notice that you need to use a hyphen (-) when you write the numbers between 21 and 99.

With long numbers, we usually divide them into groups of three which are divided by a
comma (and not a point). e.g. 5000000 (5 million) is normally written as 5,000,000

Notice that we say five million/hundred/thousand ( not five millons/hundreds/thousands),

A million is 106, or 1,000,000. A billion is one thousand million, or 1,000,000,000 (109).

This is the common usage in English-speaking countries and is called the short scale.
Countries in continental Europe and Latin America use the long scale where a billion is a
million millions (1012).

ORDINAL NUMBERS are normally used when you:

• give a date: My birthday is on the 27th of January. (Twenty-seventh of January)

• put things in a sequence or order: Liverpool came second in the football league last year.
• give the floor of a building: His office is on the tenth floor.
• have birthdays: He had a huge party for his twenty-first birthday.
• refer to centuries: Shakespeare was born in the 16th century.

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EXPRESSIONS WITH ORDINAL NUMBERS:

First impression -primera impresión
First class -primera clase, clase preferente
Second-hand -de segunda mano
Third time lucky -a la tercera va la vencida
Sixth sense -sexto sentido
Seventh heaven -séptimo cielo
At the eleventh hour - en el último momento

THE NUMBER 0

We normally say 'zero' for the number '0', but there are several ways to pronounce the number 0,
used in different contexts. Usage varies between different English-speaking countries.

ZERO
In American English zero is used for number 0 in general (0.4% = zero point four percent).
It is a word mostly used in:
Mathematical operations (0 + 1 = 1; zero plus one equals one).
Temperature (-5º C = five degrees below zero).
Countdowns (three- two- one- zero)

NOUGHT
In UK nought is used for number 0 in general (0.4% = nought point four percent).

O
Commonly used when 0 is said separately with:
Telephone numbers (604… = six, oh, for…).
Room numbers (701 = seven oh one).
Hours (5:07 = five oh seven).
Dates (1909 = nineteen oh nine).

NIL [British]
(4-0 = four – nil).
IN SPORTS NOTHING [American]
(to describe (7-0 = seven – nothing).
scores): LOVE
– In tennis (15-0 = fifteen – love). (*) It is thought that it comes from French
“l’œuf”

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DECIMAL NUMBERS

For parts of whole numbers, we use a decimal point (and not a comma).
e.g. 2 1/2 (two and a half) = 2.5 (two point five)

If there is more than one number after the decimal point, we say each number individually.
e.g. 3,456.789 = three thousand, four hundred and fifty-six point seven eight nine.

The exception to this rule is when we are talking about dollars and cents (or pound and pence).

To read a sum of money, first read the whole number and add the currency name. if there is a
decimal point, read the decimal pronounced as a whole number (not each digit individually).
e.g. $21.95 = twenty-one dollars, ninety-five (cents). Saying the word cents at the end is optional.

FRACTIONS

Read fractions using the cardinal number for the numerator and the ordinal number for the
denominator, making the ordinal number plural if the numerator is larger than 1. This applies to all
numbers except for the number 2, which is read as “half” when it is the denominator, and “halves” if
there is more than one in the numerator. Notice, as well, that for 1/4, you can say a quarter or a
fourth.

1/2 - a half 3/4 - three quarters 5/6 - five sixths 7/10 - seven tenths
1/3 - a third (three fourths) 1/7 - a seventh 1/20 - a twentieth
2/3 - two thirds 1/5 - a fifth 1/8 - an eighth 47/100 - forty-seven
1/4 - a quarter (a 2/5 - two fifths 1/10 - a tenth hundredths
fourth) 1/6 - a sixth 1/1,000 - a thousandth

MATHEMATICAL OPERATIONS:
+ Addition Ten plus/ and twenty equals / is equal to / is thirty
-10Subtraction
+ 20 = 30 Thirty-five minus / take away twenty-five equals / is equal to/
x
35Multiplication
- 25 = 10 Two multiplied by / times ten equals / is equal to /is twenty
is ten
/(multiplicación)
Division Seventy divided by ten equals / is equal to / is seven
25%
70 Twenty-five percent (without article)
2 x/10
10==207
10² Ten squared
15³ Fifteen cubed
√6 The square root of six
∛9 The cube root of nine
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More vocabulary:
Even numbers - números pares
Odd numbers- números impares
Approximately / Roughly - aproximadamente
About / Around - aproximadamente (más informal que approximately y roughly

PRONOUNCING YEARS:

In general, when the year is a four digit number, read the two digits as a whole number, the second
two digits as another whole number (they can be joined by hundred and, which is only necessary,
however, if the last two figures are 00 through 09), but from 2000 to 2010, years were usually
pronounced like ordinary cardinal numbers.

2000 - two thousand

2003 - two thousand and three

1999 - nineteen (hundred and) ninety-nine

1806 - eighteen hundred and six / eighteen oh six

To distinguish between dates before and after the birth of Christ, use BC und AD:

BC = 'Before Christ'
AD = 'Anno Domini' (in the year of the Lord)

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