How to teach telling the time, step by step
Most children learn to tell time in the same order: first o’clock, then half past, then quarter past and quarter to, then every five minutes, and finally any minute. Each level here matches one of those steps, so a sheet never asks for more than your class has learned.
Two kinds of practice
Read the clock
Children look at where the hands point and write the time. This builds reading the hour hand first, then the minute hand.
Draw the hands
Children see a time such as 7:30 and draw both hands. It is harder than reading, because they have to remember that the hour hand sits between the numbers once the minutes pass the hour.
In the Australian Curriculum
- FoundationOrdering familiar events by the time of day, such as morning tea, lunch and home time.
- Year 1Comparing and ordering events by how long they take.
- Year 2Reading the time on an analogue clock to the hour, half-hour and quarter-hour (AC9M2M04).
- Year 4Converting between units of time to solve problems about how long things take.
Version 9.0 revised the sequence for telling the time. The Year 2 content description covers o’clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to together, so the first three levels here suit Year 2, and every five minutes and any minute suit older children.
Australian timetables give plenty of real times to read: recess, lunch and home time. Put the school’s own times on the board and have children draw them on a clock face.
Summarised in our own words from the Australian Curriculum: Mathematics, Version 9.0 (ACARA).
