Best or easyest way to explain basic binary numbers to younger people?

Answer 1

all three answers a head of this one are good.
one more method should not hurt anybody.here it is.
without much explanation,start calling the first digit as one(1),and last digit as ten(10)..use your two hands and start counting,one,ten(ben),
eleven(beleven),hundred(bundred),etc.
that should help to grasp the idea.
next create grid of 10X10,delete column and the row containing 9,that will give numbers based on 9.then in the next step delete column and row containing 8,that should give idea about base 8. so on and so forth.
you can also use no of days of a week for demonstrating base 7.similarly add two more rows and two more columns( that is after column 9 and row 9) and then use this grid to explain moths of the year to duodecimal system.
hope this explanation is not too complicated.children studying in VI std.should be able to follow this explanation.

Answer 2

What do you mean by "younger"?

Explain that humans use "base ten" because of the number of fingers we have, and each colum of 0 through 9 digits can have a value equal to ten times the value of the previous column.

Then explain that computers use "base two" because they only have "one finger" per digit, and that it can only represent 0 or 1 in each column (the finger is either up or down - and be careful which finger you raise in class!). Because of that, each column can only have a value equal to two times the value of the previous column.

No doubt some smart alec will ask you we represent fractions, but you probably don't want to get into floating-point arithmetic on the first lesson.

Answer 3

explain why we count in base 10 first ie we have ten fingers and that when you reach 10 you need to use the next column.

then introduce them to a fictitious alien (unless you know a real one) who only has 2 fingers ie one on each hand and explain his counting method ie binary. most youngster will get this method.

Answer 4

Use an abacus, My little cousing saw me working with binary and he asked how to. He had small abacus and playing with it he actually knew what I was talking about. try it.