Recognize that the teens are a flaw in our number-naming system. It should be: "ten...ten-one...ten-two...ten-three..."

Early childhood math education, and all math education that follows it, suffers from a flaw in our number-naming system. One through ten are perfect. Then, there's a problem. It starts with eleven and twelve. They have no business being so-named but they're only a distraction from the bigger problem. The entirety of the "teens" make it almost impossible to teach a 4 year old that "four", "fourteen" and "twenty-four" are part of a logical continuum that continues ad-infinitum. If we wish for future generations to compete with the rest of the world in math and science, this simple error should be corrected now. It won't be easy but our children and our children's children will thank us for it.