Number Lines and Place Value
Year 3 is where children move up to numbers all the way to 1000. They read them on a number line, work out what each digit is worth, and compare and order them with growing confidence.
Practise Number Lines and Place Value
Have a guess, even if you're not sure. Get one wrong and we'll show you why, so every miss is a chance to learn.
Timed practice
The same practice, just with a gentle clock. Pick a length and see how many you can answer.
Good to know
This is a number line from 0 to 1000 with a signpost every 100, so you can see roughly where any number sits.
For grown-ups
Each question shows a clear number line or set of numbers to read and reason about, including finding 10 or 100 more or less and matching numbers to their written words. Reading a scale here is the very same skill children later use for rulers, jugs and thermometers.
What is in this topic
- Reading and estimating numbers on a number line
- The value of each digit in a three-digit number
- Comparing and ordering numbers up to 1000
- Finding 10 or 100 more or less
- Writing and reading numbers in words
How to help your child with number lines
Place value clicks when a child can both see where a number lives and say what each digit is worth, so mix pointing at the line with saying numbers out loud.
- Estimate before reading exactly. Ask which signpost a number is nearest, so 630 is spotted as a bit past 600 and closer to 600 than 700, before working out the precise spot.
- Break a number into its parts out loud. In 472 the 4 is worth 400, the 7 is worth 70 and the 2 is worth 2, and 400 plus 70 plus 2 makes 472.
- Practise 10 and 100 more or less as little hops. From 472, ten more is 482 and a hundred more is 572, so only one digit changes each time.
- Compare by lining digits up from the left. 472 and 427 both start with 4 hundreds, so look at the tens: 7 tens beats 2 tens, so 472 is bigger.
Where children get stuck
The most common wobble is reading every digit as if it were just a single number, so 472 is read as a four, a seven and a two rather than four hundreds, seven tens and two ones. Saying it as 400 and 70 and 2, and pointing to where it sits on the line, ties the digit to its real value and fixes this fast.
The other slip happens with 10 or 100 more or less when a number is about to cross a hundred. Children often keep the hundreds digit the same, so 10 more than 195 gets answered as 105 instead of 205. Counting on in tens out loud, 195, 205, 215, shows them that once the tens fill up, the hundreds tick on by one.