Concept 1 of 8
The Place Value House: Where Digits Live
Today's big idea
A digit's room decides what it is worth, so the same digit can mean 5 or 5,000.
Rooms are counted from the right, and each one holds ten times the room beside it.
How it works
👀 What's going on?
Write 2,385 and look at the 3. Is it worth three? Not here. That 3 is standing in the hundreds room, so it is worth three hundred. A digit on its own tells you nothing until you see where it is standing.
💡 Here's the trick
Look at the house above. A number is a small building, and every column is a room. Ones on the right, then Tens, then Hundreds, then Thousands. Each room to the left holds ten times what the room beside it holds. So the very same digit is worth a different amount in a different room.
🪄 How to do it
- 1.Name the rooms from the right, the way the house above names them: ones, tens, hundreds, thousands.
- 2.Find your digit and read off which room it is standing in.
- 3.Multiply the digit by whatever that room is worth.
✍️ Try it
The number 8,648 uses the digit 8 twice. What is each 8 worth?
The first 8 stands in the thousands room, so it is worth 8,000. The last 8 stands in the ones room, so it is worth just 8. Same digit, and one of them is a thousand times the other.
⚠️ Watch out
You might be thinking you can count the rooms from the left, the way you read. Start from the left in 2,385 and you would call the 2 the ones. Rooms are always counted from the right, so the ones room is the last digit, every time.
🌟 Why this matters
A price tag, a cricket score, the number of people in your town: every one of them is read this way. Get the rooms wrong and 2,385 rupees turns into 285, which is the kind of slip you notice at the counter.
Exam tip: Papers love asking what one digit is worth, because it takes seconds once you know the rooms.
Watch me solve one
Quanta solves it
“Watch how I think through one of these — then you try.”
THE PROBLEM
“What is the place value of the 3 in 5,374?”
- 1
Find the room
Count from the right: 4 = Ones, 7 = Tens, 3 = Hundreds, 5 = Thousands. 🏠
- 2
Look up the room's value
The Hundreds room is worth 100 each.
- 3
Multiply digit × room
3 × 100 = 300
- 4
Place value found ✓
The 3 is worth 300
Now you try one — same steps, different story 👇
See it in action
⚡ Time to play!
Every digit lives in a room. The house has three rooms — Hundreds, Tens, Ones. Put each digit in the right room.
THE NUMBER · ROUND 1 OF 2
Sort each digit into the correct room.
Digit tiles — tap a digit to pick it up
Quick check
✅ VERIFICATION
In the number 5,294, what is the place value of the digit 2?
⚡ Finish the activity above first to answer.
Keep going!
Up next: Number Names & Expanded Form
Say it, write it, break it apart, empty places get a 0.