Maths help for parents of children aged 5 to 11
Getting a clear concept of amount of time is important for young children. This page challenges children to complete a number of tasks in one minute, such as how tall a tower can be built using blocks/lego etc.
An important part of this is to make sure that they make an estimate/guess before starting which shows how realistic they are about time. This resource can be found in our Year 2 measurement section.
This worksheet looks at working out the times of TV programmes and how long they last. Working within units of 5 minutes much of this is straightforward. However working out the start times is a little more tricky and children need to be confident with telling the time to 5 minutes.
Newspapers and TV programme listings are a really good source of material for work on time and can also result in a lot of discussion about favourite programmes etc. They can also be used as a data source for graph work.
Here we have two pages on days of the week. The best way to use the first page is to cut the days of the week out and shuffle them. Lay them out in a random order and use them to carry out simple activities or to ask questions, such as:
Pick up the day that says Thursday.
Pick up the day that was yesterday.
What do you do on Saturdays? etc
The second page is a set of anagrams of the days of the week, courtesy of urbrainy.com which has a really good selection of worksheets on telling the time.
By year 4 children are expected to know that:
1 week = 7 days
1 day = 24 hours
1 hour = 60 minutes
1 minute = 60 seconds
This maths worksheet uses this knowledge to answer some straightforward questions. It also requires a calculator so more detailed information can be found, such as the number of minutes in a week. This, in turn, can lead on to some interesting investigative work, such as finding out how long a year is in minutes, and then how many minutes you have been alive (not forgetting leap years). It is quite an eye opener to realise how many precious minutes have been taken up in queues, traffic jams etc!!
This worksheet can be found in our Year 4 resources, under Measures
Reading the time on an analogue clock face can prove very tricky for many children, especially if they have learning difficulties such as dyslexia. The problems usually occur when the minute hand has gone past the half hour so that we are looking forward to the next hour (eg a quarter to 9) rather than minutes past. We could say 45 minutes past 8, as it is technically correct, but no-one does! To complicate things even more, we do say 8:45 (eight forty five) when reading a digital clock!
This page, which can be found in Year 2 measures, just looks at quarter and half hours and can be used as a quick guide as to whether your child has grasped the concept.
Remembering how many days there are in any particular month is a challenge for many adults, yet alone children. There is of course the rhyme, ’30 days hath September’ etc, which is included in full on the worksheet but I prefer the ‘knuckle version’ where you can use the knuckles and dips on your hands to work out the number of days.
Starting with the left hand, little finger knuckle as January, move to the dip between knuckles for February, next knuckle for March and so on until you reach July as the last knuckle (don’t use thumbs!) on the left hand and then continue with the first finger knuckle on the right hand for August, next dip for September etc. Which months have 31 days? All those that are on a knuckle! Easy!!
This page can be found in the Year 4 Measures section of the site.
This is the second in our time worksheets for Year 3 children. It is quite a bit harder than the first as it deals with hours and minutes rather than just minutes.
With the analogue displays the best way to approach this is to count on the whole hours and make a note if necessary, and then count on the extra minutes, usually in steps of 5 minutes.
With the digital display again work out the hours and then count on. This can be tricky as you may need to stop at the hour before if the minutes on the later time are less than the minutes on the earlier time (sounds complicated but an example would be from 6:55 to 8:20, only count on one whole hour to 7:55).
Reading clock faces is a tricky subject for many children, especially as they see time displayed digitally more now than ever before.
This page looks at finding lengths of time under an hour by comparing two clock faces.
There are several stages of development with this and children should be able to count up in fives confidently before starting this exercise.
At first children will probably go round the clock face counting in fives. later they might well move in 30 minute or 15 minute blocks.
This maths worksheet on reading time to the nearest quarter of an hour highlights several issues which create problems for children.
Firstly, on the clock face the hours are clearly numbered but the minutes are not and children need to be able to count on in fives before they can read minutes successfully.
Secondly, when telling someone the time we often approximate, either to the nearest quarter of an hour or the nearest five minutes, even when we can see clearly what the time is to the nearest minute.
Thirdly, when saying the time out or writing it we use several different conventions, as shown on the answer sheet.
Lastly, many children seldom come across this type of clock face, especially if they use digital watches, mobile phones etc., therefore take much longer to work it out – don’t be surprised to find ten year olds unable to read an analogue clock correctly.