Read, write, order, and compare whole numbers up to at least 1,000,000 using base-ten numerals, number names, expanded form, and place-value understanding
Six or seven digit numbers work the same way. Every three digits form a group: ones, then thousands, then millions. A comma marks where each new group starts. Each group position is worth one thousand times the next position to its right. To compare big numbers, line up their digits and find the first spot where they differ. The number with the bigger digit there is bigger. To order numbers from smallest to largest, compare two at a time and write the smallest first.
To read 403,072, read each group like its own small number, then add the group name. The first group is 403, so say four hundred three. Then say thousand. The last group is 072, so say seventy-two. A zero in the ones spot stays silent as well: 060 is just sixty. Altogether: four hundred three thousand, seventy-two.
Expanded form breaks a number into the value of each digit, added together. For 403,072, that is 400,000 + 3,000 + 70 + 2. For 1,340,000, that is 1,000,000 + 300,000 + 40,000. The group in front counts whole thousands. For example, 215,600 holds 215 whole thousands.
You already know how to compare numbers by checking digits from the left. Do the same with big numbers: line up the digits, then find the first spot where they differ. Whichever number has the bigger digit there is the bigger number.
Read a number group by group, write it in words or expanded form, and compare big numbers by finding the first digit that differs.
The school recycling drive counted 403,072 bottle caps. You still compare numbers by reading digits from the left, and that has not changed. What is new is the comma: it bundles the digits three at a time so a long number stays readable.
Where does the comma split 403,072?
Jobs that lean on this skill. Follow one to see everything it is built on.
17 questions wait behind this lesson, each with its answer explained. Every answer feeds the sky: stars light as they are learned, and dim when it is time to come back.