Ever have one of those years when you just what a do
over? Well I’m having one of those
years. In our district we have had so
many changes that I just can’t wait for the year to be over so I can plan for
next year. This year we started a new
math series. Next year we will have a
new reading series Benchmark Literacy. (Which I will create new trifolds
for. If you have been following me over
the years you may know I created trifolds for the Treasure series with Ms.
Winston- now Mrs. Saunders. ) I will still offer the trifolds for free on TPT.
Telling time is difficult.
For starters there are two, sometimes 3 hands and students have to remember
which hand is which. Then, although
there are only 12 numbers written on the clock face, they have different values. Sometimes the 1 really is a 1 but sometimes
it means 5 min. Then the 3- sometimes it’s 3, sometimes it’s 15 min, and it can be a
quarter hour. And we haven’t started on ‘to’
and ‘past’. No wonder students struggle
with telling time. I have a few students
who are still having problems with telling time. Then yesterday I attended math training for
our grade level after school. Someone
mentioned that they had tried one of her ideas this past quarter for telling
time that worked out wonderfully.
Something I never thought to do. Telling time only teaching the hour
hand. Hmmm
So I was thinking of trying this with my some of my math
groups next week. Teaching only the hour
hand. My thinking is something like
this:
Teach only the hour hand because it counts the hours around
the clock. It takes one hour to move
from one number to the next number which means that we can tell the time (more
or less) with just this one hand. Teach
just hours.
Next, move on to the half hours. We stop the hour hand exactly half way between
two numbers. Talk about the fact that
because it takes one whole hour to move from 1 to 2, when it is exactly
half-way between the 1 and 2 it is half
past the hour or 1:30.
Then I move on the quarter hour and etc. I don’t know if this makes sense or not. I thought it wouldn’t hurt to try. Most of my students have mastered time. I just a have a few things to wrap up on this
unit and a few students who still don’t get it yet. So maybe this strategy may help. Has anyone tried this before? I would be curious to hear your comments
about it.
3 comments:
I always do something like this, too. I call it 'the minute hand fell off the clock'. I cover the minute hand on our large teaching clock with my hand (and I tell the students that isn't where it really is!), move the hour hand somewhere and ask the students to write what time it is. They do really well!
(If the clock had a different fastener, I would take it off entirely.)
Glad to hear that this works. I feel much better about trying this now with my kiddos.
I like the expression "the minute hand fell off the clock". I will have to borrow that when I try it next week. I hope you don't mind.
Thank- you for sharing your experience with us.
Here's the trick to help my kids identify the name and function of the hands.
Hour has 4 letters.
Minute has 6 letters.
Hour = short word, short hand.
Minute = longer word, longer hand
Look at the hour hand FIRST
Write the hour hand FIRST.
Repeating this often will help it sink in.
Patty
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