Thousand Million Billion Trillion (classroom activity)

Comparing Thousand, Million, Billion, and Trillion

Worksheet

Time-based Comparisons

Thousand

If you started counting 1, 2, 3, every second, it would take:

  • ~16.6 minutes to count to 1 thousand

Million

Counting to 1 million seconds would take:

  • 12 days from now, nearly two weeks

Billion

Counting to 1 billion seconds would take:

  • Almost 32 years from now

Trillion

Counting to 1 trillion seconds would take:

  • 31,688 years, 8 months, 25 days, 3 hours, 58 minutes, and 25 seconds

How to say the year 33712:

  • Thirty-Three Thousand Seven Hundred Twelve

Distance-based Comparisons (Using Steps)

Assuming each step is about 2.5 feet long.

Let's walk 100 steps

Walking 100 steps is approximately 250 feet. How long did this take us? About 1 minute or so, yeah?

Thousand

If we walked ten times the amount we just walked, that would be 1,000 steps. This would be: 2,500 feet. 2,500 is 0.4734848 miles, so in other words, 1,000 steps is nearly a half mile, and would take us about ten minutes.

Million

Walking 1 million steps would be walking one thousand steps one thousand times. This is approximately 473.5 miles. This would be like walking from Omaha to the Mall of American in Bloomington, MN. This would be about 6.58 days of walking, nonstop.

Trillion

Walking 1 trillion steps would be walking one million steps steps 1 million times. This is 473,484,848.48 miles, or, walking to the moon and back 1,000 times. It would take about 18,021 years of walking, nonstop.