Numberjacks

The Numberjacks are superheroes; animated numbers who solve mathematical problems in the real world with input from real children. The series is aimed at four to five year old girls and boys and will help them develop early maths skills, knowledge and understanding.

The Numberjacks' base is inside a sofa. Each episode focuses on one mathematical concept or idea to encourage learning with numbers. In each episode, the Numberjacks get a call from an agent (a child) telling them of a problem. After comedy and thrills, the problem is solved and the Numberjacks return to base. The episode ends with a question for the children watching at home. This will encourage children to look for, and discover, shapes and numbers around the home. Their answers are then displayed the next week in the Solutions Gallery in the 'Show and Tell' section of the CBeebies website.

The characters

The central characters are Numberjacks 3, 4, 5 and 6.

• 3 is a bit young to go out on missions, but keen to - full of confidence, energy and noise.
• 4 has more self doubts but keeps plugging away.
• 5 is quite cool and assured and a graceful jumper.
• 6 is very self confident and a great jumper.

The problems are sometimes caused by the younger Numberjacks 0, 1 and 2 escaping from the sofa and inadvertently making things go wrong. More often though, the source of trouble is one of the five Meanies; the Problem Blob, the Shape Japer, Spooky Spoon, the Puzzler and the Number Taker.

The Baddies

The Baddies tend to be the cause of different sorts of problems!

• The Problem Blob is a great lump whose blobs of slime make things go wrong.
• The Shape Japer delights in changing the shape of things, doesn't talk much, but laughs a lot.
• Spooky Spoon loves stirring things up and mixing things.
• The Puzzler is a third rate DJ who loves to set weird puzzles for the Numberjacks to solve.
• The Numbertaker is a silent grabber of numbers and uses his various attachments like the number grabber and the number sucker-upper.