Writing and Numbers - Signs & Symbols Author:Jean Cooke Signs and symbols are all around us in the modern world, from traffic lights and bar codes to soccer matches and computer languages. These books look at the many forms of non-verbal communication that we encounter every day. They are specially designed to meet the needs of cross-curricular project work within the framework of the National Curric... more »ulum, and will be a useful resource for children's topic work on communications. "Writing and Numbers" looks at the different ways in which people write and count. The author begins by describing the history of writing, from the first cave paintings and Egyptian hieroglyphics to the development of the first alphabets. She also examines the different kinds of writing in use today, including the pictograms of Chinese and Braille. The latter part of the book looks at how we count and explains the variety of systems of counting necessary for specific purposes, such as the binary system used in computing. Throughout, there are suggestions for activities and puzzles to solve.« less