On January 23 2013 NALA held its first plain numbers event in the National College of Ireland. The workshop was hosted by Daniel Sellers, Numeracy Consultant and Claire O’Riordan, NALA Plain English Coordinator. Participants were shown how to present numbers in a clear, understandable way and took part in exercises that showed how difficult it can be to identify the meaning of numbers. There was also a lively discussion on the advantages and disadvantages of using graphs to display numerical information.
Some helpful tips from the day included writing numbers from one to nine in letters and from 10 on in numbers, for example 12 or 250 and to spell numbers when they appear at the start of a sentence. Another useful tip for presenting numbers in spreadsheets is to align the numbers to the right, as this is the easiest way to read them.
