We have now learned how to read decimal numbers. You know that 4.56 is read as "four and fifty-six hundredths." But not all decimal numbers are hundredths numbers. Some are tenths numbers, some are thousandths, and some are even ten thousandths.
We know that 4.5 is read as "four wholes and five tenths." We read 4.561 as "four and five hundred sixty-one thousandths." But how do we make sure that we read the decimals correctly?
The location of the decimal point tells us the value of the number. A place value grid will help us read and write numbers with decimals.
Remember, the place on the left side of the decimal point is for the whole number. The place on the right side of the decimal point is for the decimal number.
How do we read this? The rule is simple. Read the number followed by the name of the place value column where the last digit lies. In the example above, we read the number as 5. Where is the number located? The number lies in the tenths place. So we read the number as "five tenths."
Our number is 17, and the last digit is located in the hundredths place. We read 0.17 as "seventeen hundredths."
In our last example, the number is 2. It is located in the thousandths place. We read 0.002 as "two thousandths."
