An educational device (11) for visually modeling words or numerals. The device including a plurality of inverted U-shaped rods (15) and a plurality of balls (17), each ball (17) being movable between a non display position and a display position. When the device is used to represent a word, the number of rods (15) having a ball in the display position corresponds to the number of phonemes in the word and the number of balls (17) or a respective rod (15) represents the number of letters in a respective phoneme. When the device visually represents a number, each rod having a ball in the display position represents a unit from which the number is formed, and the number of balls in a respective display position can represent the relative size of a respective unit.
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