Does Language Make You Better at Math?

Have you ever paused to consider the word “eleven”? It doesn’t sound like “one” or “ten.” Neither does “twelve.” For a young child just learning to count, these words are bafflingly arbitrary. Why, after a perfectly logical sequence from one to ten, does the system suddenly break down? You might dismiss it as a simple quirk of English, but what if these quirks have a profound impact on a child’s ability to learn math?

The fascinating and often surprising connection between the language we speak and our cognitive abilities is a rich field of study. When it comes to mathematics, the evidence suggests that the very words we use for numbers can either build a smooth ramp to understanding or place frustrating hurdles in our path. This isn’t about one language being “smarter” than another, but about how some languages provide a clearer, more logical map of the mathematical world.

The Trouble with ‘Eleven’ and ‘Twelve’

Let’s take a closer look at the English number system. It’s a base-10 system, meaning it’s built around groups of ten. However, our words for numbers often obscure this fact. As mentioned, eleven and twelve are unique, irregular words derived from Old English terms meaning “one left” and “two left” (after counting to ten). They offer no clue about their relationship to the number ten.

Things get slightly better with the “teens,” but they’re still problematic. We have thirteen, fourteen, and fifteen—not the more logical “three-teen,” “four-teen,” and “five-teen.” The order is also inverted. We say “fourteen” instead of “ten-four,” which puts the smaller unit (the “four”) before the larger unit (the “teen” representing ten).

For a child, this creates a significant cognitive load. Instead of learning a simple, repeatable rule for numbers after ten, they have to memorize a dozen special cases before the pattern becomes somewhat regular with twenty-one, twenty-two, and so on. They are learning names, not a system.

The Transparent Alternative: The ‘Ten-Plus’ System

Now, let’s journey to East Asia and look at languages like Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. Their number systems are remarkably transparent and perfectly mirror the base-10 structure.

In Mandarin Chinese:

• Ten is 十 (shí)
• One is 一 (yī)
• Eleven is 十一 (shí yī), which literally translates to “ten-one.”
• Twelve is 十二 (shí èr), or “ten-two.”
• Twenty is 二十 (èr shí), or “two-ten.”
• Twenty-one is 二十一 (èr shí yī), or “two-ten-one.”

This pattern is perfectly consistent. Once a child learns the words for one through ten, they possess all the linguistic building blocks needed to construct every number up to 99. There are no exceptions to memorize. The language itself teaches the concept of place value. The number 21 isn’t just a name; its verbal structure, “two-ten-one”, explicitly states its mathematical composition.

The Proof is in the Preschool

This isn’t just a neat linguistic theory; research has shown it has real-world consequences for early learning. In a landmark study, psychologist Kevin Miller and his colleagues compared the counting abilities of American and Chinese preschoolers. By the age of four, Chinese children could typically count much higher than their American peers. While American children often struggled after reaching 10, their Chinese counterparts, armed with a logical number system, could often continue counting seamlessly to 40, 50, and beyond.

The transparent number words give them a cognitive head start. They grasp the base-10 principle intuitively because their language reinforces it with every number they speak. In contrast, an English-speaking child must first be explicitly taught the concept of place value to understand what “11” actually means, long after they’ve memorized the word for it.

Beyond Counting: A Built-in Abacus?

The benefits of a transparent number system extend beyond simple counting and into basic arithmetic. Think about adding 25 + 12.

In a language like Chinese, this problem is essentially spoken as “(two-ten five) plus (one-ten two).” The linguistic structure itself encourages the decomposition of numbers. It’s easier to mentally group the tens (“two-ten” + “one-ten” = “three-ten”) and then the ones (“five” + “two” = “seven”). The answer is already formed: “three-ten seven” (三十七, sān shí qī).

The language provides a kind of mental abacus, a scaffold that makes manipulating numbers and understanding their values more direct and intuitive. For English speakers, the process requires an extra step of mental translation from the opaque words (“twenty-five”) to the abstract concepts of tens and ones.

A Global Linguistic Quirk

This isn’t just an East-vs-West phenomenon. Many languages have their own unique ways of handling numbers.

• Welsh: It also has a highly transparent system. Eleven is un ar ddeg (“one on ten”).
• Turkish: Similar to Chinese, it’s very regular. Eleven is on bir (“ten one”).
• French: Famously complex, it combines base-10 with vestiges of a base-20 system. Seventy is soixante-dix (“sixty-ten”), but eighty is quatre-vingts (“four-twenties”), and ninety is quatre-vingt-dix (“four-twenty-ten”). This presents its own unique set of learning challenges.
• German: It uses an inversion for two-digit numbers. Twenty-one is einundzwanzig (“one-and-twenty”). This can lead to “transposition errors”, where a child hearing “one-and-twenty” might be tempted to write 12 instead of 21.

Is Language Mathematical Destiny?

So, does speaking English doom you to a life of mathematical mediocrity? Absolutely not. This linguistic advantage is most pronounced in the early years of learning. Once a child, regardless of language, has firmly grasped the abstract concept of base-10 and place value, the initial linguistic hurdles become far less significant. Higher-level mathematics deals with concepts far beyond simple arithmetic, where the names of numbers are irrelevant.

Furthermore, many other factors contribute to mathematical proficiency, including teaching methods, educational resources, and cultural attitudes toward the subject. We can compensate for English’s opaque number words by using tools like Cuisenaire rods or base-10 blocks, which provide a physical, visual representation of what transparent languages do verbally.

Ultimately, the link between language and math isn’t about declaring a “winner”. Instead, it’s a powerful reminder that our words are more than just labels. They are the fundamental tools we use to structure our thoughts and understand the world. The language you speak gives you your very first lesson in numbers, long before you ever open a textbook. And that, in itself, is a beautiful equation.