What's the deal with the number 12?

[Frazzle]

What I have noticed is that in the 80s, many of the counting clips & animations stopped at the number 12. The pinball song, & the ringmaster animations are perfect examples. In the mid 80s, why did they stop at 12 as the highest number that was taught? I have two theories:

The number 13 is sometimes considered taboo & unlucky, so nobody wanted to teach the number 13 exclusively.

The number 12 is the highest number on a clock face. I was guessing that perhaps they stop at 12 because, other than teaching numbers up to 12 as a preliminary lesson to the concept of how to tell time, most children in the primary audience age group were not counting all that high yet.

I was reading & counting at a very young age, but I'm guessing that many of the pre-K & Kindergartners were not going past the number 10 yet... Unless like I was saying, they taught up to number 12, because it is the highest number on a clock & young children were being given an introduction to the numbers 11 & 12, to avoid the confusion of seeing a pair of ones, & a one paired with a two & not knowing they are entirely different numbers.

Just thinking & wondering...

 

[gbrobeck]

What I have noticed is that in the 80s, many of the counting clips & animations stopped at the number 12. The pinball song, & the ringmaster animations are perfect examples. In the mid 80s, why did they stop at 12 as the highest number that was taught? I have two theories:

The number 13 is sometimes considered taboo & unlucky, so nobody wanted to teach the number 13 exclusively.

The number 12 is the highest number on a clock face. I was guessing that perhaps they stop at 12 because, other than teaching numbers up to 12 as a preliminary lesson to the concept of how to tell time, most children in the primary audience age group were not counting all that high yet.

I was reading & counting at a very young age, but I'm guessing that many of the pre-K & Kindergartners were not going past the number 10 yet... Unless like I was saying, they taught up to number 12, because it is the highest number on a clock & young children were being given an introduction to the numbers 11 & 12, to avoid the confusion of seeing a pair of ones, & a one paired with a two & not knowing they are entirely different numbers.

Just thinking & wondering...

Don't forget that "Honk Around a Clock" obviously only went up to 12. Really makes you think.


Greg

 

[Frazzle]

Yeah, true. I'm wondering if the writers did this by accident, or intent.

 

[Drtooth]

The number 13 is sometimes considered taboo & unlucky, so nobody wanted to teach the number 13 exclusively.

Ironically they would later have a song called "Lucky Thirteen"


Anyway, I guess that A it is refference to clocks, teaching kids about time. (If I can remember a sort of small Timer like clock was used in Pinball Number count). And B) It's more Poetic (at least for pinball Number count)

It's funny, because I was about to ask this very question!

 

[Frazzle]

Were there any other specific songs directed to count & stop at the number 12? I'm trying to refresh my memory. There was a claymation clip with a bunch of rocks that had to do with the number 12. I'm just trying to see if there were any others, because it seems that some of these things sit on a back shelf in your mind until they are brought up again. You blow the dust off of the old memory & take another good look at it & it all comes back to you.

 

[Splurge]

Were there any other specific songs directed to count & stop at the number 12? I'm trying to refresh my memory. There was a claymation clip with a bunch of rocks that had to do with the number 12.

I think that clip was done by Jim Henson. It has the same feel as "King of 8". I believe someone here said they saw a sketch of it at a Henson exhibit.

 

[Sidebottom]

Don't forget that "Honk Around a Clock" obviously only went up to 12. Really makes you think.

Well, that's simply because the clock goes up to 12.

-Sidebottom

 

[Frazzle]

Also there are 12 months in a year, so that may be another reason to center around the number 12.

 

[gbrobeck]

Well, that's simply because the clock goes up to 12.

-Sidebottom

Well of course! That's why I mentioned it (and why I said it was obvious why that song only went up to 12). But it seems that there were more sketches that could be used in any episode that only went up to 12, or series of sketches that only went up to 12 then there were anything else. And that brings up another question I've been wondering about: why in those series sketches (Grace Slick and the spies, Pinball Number Count, etc.) why is there no sketch for the number 1?


Greg

 

[Frazzle]

Yeah, that is strange how they didn't make clips foe the number 1. I guess because there isn't a whole lot of fun in showing just one of anything in those cartoons.