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Read the Hour and Minute Hands on an Analog Clock

Students identify the hour hand and minute hand on an analog clock and understand the role of each. Students practice reading the hour hand to determine the current hour and the minute hand to determine minutes.

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Read the Hour and Minute Hands on an Analog Clock

Grade 2 · Telling Time · question 1 of 3

0 of 12

12 rungs. A star at the top.

123456789101112

Read the clock.

Your answer:

How it is taught

0:00 of 4:49

The short hand names the hour.

The long hand names the minutes.

51015202530354045505560123456789101112

Read it: Counting minutes by fives

You look at the clock. Counting every minute around would be slow. The minute hand is on 8, and the clock reads 2:40.

  1. Find the minute hand. It points at a numeral.
  2. Count by fives around to the 8: 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40.
  3. The minute hand on 8 is 40 minutes. Read 2:40.

Counting every minute around the clock works, but it is slow, and you lose the count.

Each numeral is 5 minutes, so jumping numeral to numeral is five times faster.

The hour hand names the hour; the minute hand names the minutes. They do different jobs.

The minute hand counts minutes by fives around the numerals.

Reading the 8 as 8 minutes instead of 40.

The 8 is a numeral. Count by fives to it: 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40.

The short hand is just past 9 and the long hand points at the 1. What time is it? — 9:05. The long hand counts minutes by fives round the numerals, so the 1 is 5 minutes past 9.

Reading 3:20 on an analog clock

Today we'll learn to read an analog clock. It has two hands that work together to tell us the time.

Here is our clock. The numbers one through twelve go all the way around.

Grade 2 · Meet the two hands of a clock

This short, fat hand is the hour hand. It tells us the hour.

This long, skinny hand is the minute hand. It tells us the minutes.

Let's read the hour first. Which number is the short hand pointing near?

It's just past the three, so the hour is three.

Now the minutes. The long hand points to the four. But four doesn't mean four minutes!

We count by fives around the clock: five, ten, fifteen, twenty.

The long hand at the four means twenty minutes.

Three hours and twenty minutes — we say three twenty.

The time is three twenty. The short hand gives the hour, the long hand gives the minutes. Great job!

Now you try. Read this clock and type the time. What time is it?

What you see

While they climb, your page writes one true line to ask about tonight, and a short note each Sunday.

MayaGrade 3 · Mathematics
Did you know?

A chessboard has 64 squares — share them out between the 8 rows and each row holds exactly 8.

Today’s goal
1 star — one skill mastered, every rung of its ladder climbed
Climbing now
Divide within 100

An example student.

MayaGrade 3 · Mathematics

Maya earned 2 stars this week — Interpret multiplication as equal groups, which took 6 answers over 3 days before its star landed 3 days ago and Multiply by 6, 7, 8 and 9. Next up: Divide within 100.

An example week.

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Read the Hour and Minute Hands on an Analog Clock — Grade 2 Mathematics