A split-pin paper clock with moving hands, plus eighteen cards of things we actually do all day. Set the clock to match the card - telling the time, without a worksheet in sight.
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Telling the time was going badly. The worksheets were joyless and half past kept coming out as half to.
What changed it was making the clock instead of reading one. Cutting the hands out, pushing the split pin through, turning them himself - the o clock and the half past became things he did with his fingers.
The cards were the second half of it. Not abstract times, but our times: breakfast at seven, school at eight, bath at six thirty. He knows the shape of his own day, so the clock face got attached to something he already understood.
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Print on card and cut out the clock face and both hands. Colour the hour hand red and the minute hand blue.
Punch the centre of the clock and the fat end of each hand, then push the split pin through both hands and the face and open the legs at the back.
Check it turns freely. If it is stiff, widen the hole slightly - a clock that jams gets abandoned.
Practise the hours first, all twelve, before mentioning minutes at all. Red hand on the number, blue hand on the twelve.
Cut out the time cards and read a few together: brush your teeth at 7 o clock, story at half past six.
Deal three cards face down. Turn one over and set the clock to match, then check it against the answer on the back.
Swap roles - they set a time and you read it out, and get it wrong on purpose sometimes so they can correct you.
Lay the eighteen cards out in the order of a real day, from waking up to lights out, and hang the finished line on the fridge.
Clock wheel + 18 picture time cards (PDF)
Four pages: a clock face to assemble with a split pin, both hands, and eighteen daily-routine time cards, each with a simple picture so little ones know what happens at that time.
Learning Resources geared student clock on Amazon
The geared hands are the point - move the minute hand and the hour hand creeps with it, which is the bit paper clocks cannot show.
Want more? Browse all our free printables for kids.
Colour-code the hands and never change the colours. Red for hours, blue for minutes, on every clock you draw for a month - that single consistency did more here than any amount of explaining.
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