When i was about five, i couldnt figure out what number came after fourteen. i knew it sounded like fourteen, so when i counted to twenty out loud, i would say fourteen twice, but the second time i would say it faster, and mumble it a bit. i didnt think any grown ups ever caught on, and i thought i was so clever.

Liz

I thought that if I spent enough time, I could write the biggest number in the world. So I took a piece of chalk and wrote a 1, and then started following it with lots of zeros. (By the way, I was writing on the outside of my house, which didn't make my dad very happy!)

When I had written enough zeros, I proudly showed it to my Dad, who, after calming down from yelling at me about writing on the house, said, "Whatever number you write, I can write a bigger number." I said, "No you can't", and to prove me wrong he took the chalk and drew another zero. Then it dawned on me that there is no largest number!

This led to "infinity" matches with my sister. She would say something involving "infinity", and I would respond with "infinity times infinity" and she would retort with "infinity times infinity plus a googol" and so on ad infinitum!

Kdees

When I was about 5, I never knew about the number seven.

I used to count 1 2 3 4 5 6 8 9 10. I remember the shock when, on holiday, my parents told me about sevens.

I still think it was rather a pity; if they'd never told me, I would have been one of the only five-year olds in the UK who could count in base nine...

David Given

That the multiplication tables were made up by someone just like someone decided how to spell words. I just learnt them by heart, never understanding that 4 times 5 really makes 20.

Tintomara

When I was first learning subtraction with two-digit numbers, we were told that to subtract a big digit from a little digit, you have to "borrow a one" from the tens place, which of course reduced the digit in the tens place by one. All true.

The problem was that I had been told very clearly as a child that when you GIVE something you get to keep it, but when you BORROW something, you have to give it back -- it isn't really yours. When the teacher completed the problem on the blackboard, I asked her when we were going to give the one back. She looked at me as if I was crazy, and said that you don't give it back.

I found this rather disturbing, and from that day to this I have always thought that subtraction was mean and unfair.

Ernest

I used to believe there was a number "eleventeen". I could never quite work out where it went, though.

Matthew

I used to think that 100+1=101 was too easy and therefore I thought it was wrong. I was soon corrected by my teacher who heard me calling somebody who thought that stupid.

Drew

My parents went and told everybody I could do math at the tender age of 4. It would go like this: "What's 12 minus 6 ?" Me: 6. "What's 4 divided by 2?`" Me: 2.
Later, I found out the hard way, that math wasn't just about repeating the last number you heard. Oh and for a while I thought 1+1 would be 11. Made perfect sense to me.
I still suck at math...

Moritz

When in primary school we were taught with coloured wooden blocks marked with notches how to count, addition, subtraction etc. For example ten was always red, five green, single units were yellow. To this day I still relate colours to shapes and numbers and vice versa. Red + green = 15. I'm 34 (three yellows + four yellows) and an accountant.

Bewildered

I thought I was the only weirdo in existence who thought numbers had gender and personality but I see I wasn't the only one! Even more bizarre though, is that I felt they had "ages" also--1 & 2 were older, 3 & 4 were younger, 5 & 6 older, etc.

Muffin

I was convinced that there was a number called "eleventeen", but was never sure how to count to it or where it lay in the great order of numbers. I just knew it was there.

Brian Bascle

I sincerly believed that numbers only went up to ten when i was around 2-3. Yep the next year when we started things like 20 and 100 i was amazed and quite convinced that they had just been invented. yep i was very proud to be around for the invention of numbers over ten.

Shantia

I used to think certain numbers had personalities.9 was very smart and manipulative, and if other numbers didn't watch it, she'd add herself to them and rob them of their rightful place in the "teens". 4 wouldn't become 14, but only 13, etc. Four and six were nice, but easily fooled (especially 4), 7 was smart and 8 was bossy like my sister. Go figure! ;)

LHW

I used to believe that after the number "ten" came the numbers "tendy-one, tendy-two..." etc.

Anon