Time — Tasmanian Year 3 Maths
Reading analog clocks to the minute, reading and saying digital times, and changing a time from one kind of clock to the other. Three subtopics and 60 practice questions, aligned to AC9M3M04.
Time in Tasmanian Year 3
This topic is about reading the time. Students read an analog clock from o'clock and quarter hours down to the exact minute, read and say digital times, and change a time from one kind of clock to the other. They learn to say a time both as minutes past and as minutes to the hour.
The three subtopics below are Tell time to the minute (analog), Read digital time and Convert between analog and digital time. Time is one of the 18 topics in Tasmanian Year 3 Maths and belongs to the Measurement strand. All three subtopics come under Australian Curriculum code AC9M3M04. These skills lead on to Year 4 time work, where am and pm, first met here on digital clocks, are used fully.
Subtopics
Time: common questions
How do you teach a child to read an analog clock?
Start with the two hands: the short hand shows the hour and the long hand shows the minutes. Then count by fives around the numbers, so the minute hand on the 5 means 25 minutes past. Practise o'clock and half past first, then quarter past and quarter to, then any five minutes, then single minutes.
What does "minutes to" the hour mean?
Once the minute hand passes the 6, we often count the minutes left until the next hour. At 4:40 there are 20 minutes left until 5 o'clock, so it is twenty to five. The hour hand is nearly at the 5, which is why we name the next hour.
How do you change an analog time into a digital time?
Write the hour, a colon, then the minutes as two digits. Ten past six is \(6\!:\!10\), and five past three is \(3\!:\!05\), not 3:5. For quarter to, the hour is still the one before: quarter to twelve is \(11\!:\!45\).
What mistakes do children make with time, and how can we practise?
Children often mix up the two hands, name the wrong hour when the hour hand is between two numbers, and drop the zero in digital times such as \(2\!:\!05\). At home, ask your child to read the kitchen clock at set times, such as before dinner, and to say the same time in two ways.
Which curriculum codes cover Time in Tasmanian Year 3?
All three subtopics come under Australian Curriculum v9 code AC9M3M04, which covers how analog and digital clocks show hours and minutes, and reading times to the exact minute.