Have you ever felt confused when saying dates in English? Would you like to know how to read the ordinal numbers? If you answered yes to either question, then this lesson is for you.

 

✅ Rules for writing dates (mm/dd/yy) or (dd/mm/yy):

- In British English, the order of writing is day-month-year.

- And in American English it is month-day-year.

 

➡ For example, December 1st, 2010:

American English: 12/01/2020

British English: 01/12/2020

 

✅ We use ordinal numbers like December 1st, 2010 (the first of December) when we say dates.

 

Ordinal numbers:

– First - 1st 

– Second - 2nd

– Third - 3rd 

– Fourth - 4th

– Fifth - 5th 

– Sixth - 6th 

– Seventh - 7th 

– Eighth - 8th 

– Ninth - 9th 

– Tenth - 10th 

– Eleventh - 11th 

– Twelfth - 12th 

– Thirteenth - 13th 

– Fourteenth - 14th 

– Fifteenth - 15th 

– Sixteenth - 16th 

– Seventeenth - 17th 

– Eighteenth - 18th 

– Nineteenth - 19th 

– Twentieth - 20th 

 

Note that the abbreviation for ordinal number refers to the second number:

– Twenty-first - 21st 

– Twenty-second - 22nd

– Twenty-third - 23rd

– Twenty-fourth - 24th

– Twenty-fifth -25th 

– Twenty-sixth - 26th

– Twenty-seventh - 27th

– Twenty-eighth - 28th

– Twenty-ninth - 29th

– Thirtieth - 30th

– Thirty-first - 31st

 

Note that "five" becomes "fifth", "nine" becomes "ninth" and "twenty" and "thirty" become "twentieth" and "thirtieth".

 

✅ Months of the year:

 

1- January 

2- February

3- March

4- April

5- May

6- June

7- July

8- August 

9- September

10- October

11- November 

12- December 

 

✅ Days of the week:

 

– Monday

– Tuesday

– Wednesday

– Thursday

– Friday

– Saturday

– Sunday

 

Let’s practice!

 

Write in the comments section your answers for these questions:

 

➡ What day is it today?

➡ When is your birthday?

 

We hope this lesson has been helpful for you.

Schedule a lesson today to practice with our native speaker tutors. Use the code LIMLAUNCH to get a 50% discount!