In a recent edition of "Mathematics Teaching" Midge Pasternack argued the case for the use of the 0-99 square with young children rather than the ubiquitous 1-100 square. In this article, the author would like to take the opportunity to mount a defence in favour of the much maligned 1-100 square. His main criticism of the 0-99 square (apart from…

Charlotte, the author's 11-year-old daughter, was born with Down syndrome, and is currently attending the local middle school. In terms of her disability Charlotte is developing very well and has a reading age of 9+, however her maths skills age is approximately 4 years. It is not necessarily the case that if a child has good language and literacy…