Zero - a vehicle to place value understanding

Understanding of place value in numeracy has been debated amongst teachers and mathematics teacher educators for many years. More recently the debate has been heightened in New Zealand with the introduction of the New Zealand Numeracy Framework. In this article I describe a study that has investigated children's and teachers' understanding of place value, with particular focus on the concept of the number 'zero'. The study reveals the developmental progression of children's understanding of zero, and difficulties they have articulating place value understanding. The teachers articulated the importance of place value understanding but demonstrated their own confusions about place value meaning. At the end of this study the implications for teaching and learning place value understandings are considered