I use tallies to communicate numbers with my illiterate, non-German speaking students. Easy, I thought before the first time I tried it. I had to learn that tallying – you know, four vertical lines and one diagonal one signifies five – is not a universal concept. Even the ones that had some schooling do not know the concept. Quite a few have a hard time understanding and learning it.
PS re: the title – Yes, I just had a famous episode of Star Trek on my you tube feed.
pictures imperfect blog 
Great photo, its often too easy to not think about some very strong differences. I do remember tallying!
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Did you find out the tally system most of them know?
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No, unfortunately not. Those that struggle are usually the ones that cannot comfortably calculate beyond 20, adding and dividing only. And I have barely enough time to teach them a language and reading and writing in that language. I incorporate games that involve counting and a bit of calculating (like with dice) but more I don’t feel I can do.
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Of course you can’t! Maths is beyond your pay grade!
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I’ll manage up to 10!!
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