How to teach a child to determine the time by the clock

Parents are the guides of the child to this complex and diverse world. In nature, any parents teach the baby the necessary life skills. Animals certainly teach the little one patience, show how to get their own food, how to protect themselves from danger. The task of man is also not simple. Today it’s not enough to teach your baby to walk, hold a spoon, dress yourself and take care of yourself. The modern world dictates its own conditions - for a baby to grow up to be full-fledged and competitive, he must learn a lot from early childhood. And one of the most necessary skills is the ability to determine the time by the clock, navigate in time, know about time intervals, etc. In this article, we will talk about when to teach a child to recognize time, and also consider the simplest but most effective teaching methods.

When to teach a child to determine the time by the clock

For a child, time is an incomprehensible and abstract concept that in most cases does not mean anything. That is, when mom says “no time” - this is understandable, but where to get it and where to get it is completely unclear. Acquaintance with time begins after two years, when the child begins to master such simple concepts as Today, Tomorrow, Evening, Morning. It is very important to explain to the baby what the past, present and future are. Yesterday we built a snowman - this time has passed and nothing can be changed in the past. Now we are building a pyramid - this is what we are doing directly at the moment. Tomorrow we will go to the theater - this is the future that will come in one day. Having these basic concepts, the baby will be at least a little oriented in the temporary space.

But the watch is a much more serious mechanism, the acquaintance with which should take place at about 5-7 years. It is advisable to teach the child to navigate clockwise before he goes to school. After all, when visiting an educational institution, knowledge of the clock is extremely necessary. But before you start studying the watch, be sure to make sure that the baby knows the numbers and numbers. This is what a child needs to know in order to be ready to set the time by the clock.

The kid should be able to count to 100, know the principle of counting - first tens, then units.

The child must visually know the numbers - at least from one to 12. He should immediately immediately call the number he sees in front of him without any problems.

The child should be able to write these numbers (1-12), to know their sequence.

The child must know such spatial concepts as “before” and “after”. That is, you need to explain to him that before he goes outside, he needs to get dressed, and after he finishes the walk, he will have lunch.

Learning will be much simpler and easier if the baby is familiar with concepts such as half and quarter. This is quite easy to explain with an apple - just cut it in half and divide one half into two more parts. To make it easier for the child to later learn how the watch works, you can cut the halves and quarters from the circle.

If you decide to start teaching a child, remember that children are poorly perceived by information, they need to touch, feel, check. To do this, be sure to buy or make a layout of the dial with two arrows and numbers on it. You can make a double dial - on the bottom indicate minutes, and on the top - hours. Cut the segments so that the upper values ​​can be bent and see the number of minutes.

Classes should not be difficult, painful and long.But they must be regular. Children quickly forget everything and without repetition your efforts will become useless. Exercise every day for 10-15 minutes, this will be enough so that in a couple of weeks the child will be fully oriented in time and hours. Do not force the baby - violence will only reject it, there will be no desire to learn, which means that all your efforts will also remain in vain. By the way, you can interest a child by buying him a beautiful and fashionable watch. This is a great incentive to understand how they work.

How to prepare for the study of watches

In order for the baby to more clearly represent the clock, you need to have a great understanding of other time periods.

The child should be free to understand the seasons, unmistakably know their characteristics. That is, winter is snow, New Year's eve, skiing, playing snowballs and building a snowman. Spring - trees bloom, snowdrops grow, icicles melt. Summer is a pool, berries and fruits, ice cream, hiking in the forest. Autumn - leaves fall, birds fly to warmer climes, etc.

It is necessary to teach the child all the names of the months - he must know what season a particular month belongs to.
Explain to the baby that a month can consist of 31, 30, 28 or 29 days, tell the child about it.

Teach him such a thing as a week. Tell us that the week has 7 days, in each of which we do something planned. For example, from Monday to Friday, a child goes to kindergarten, Saturday and Sunday - weekends that we spend with our family.

Tell your child what a day is, how many hours are in them, how many minutes are in each hour. It is worth noting that at the initial stage it is better not to sharpen the time in seconds so that the baby does not get confused in too large volumes of information. When he begins to understand the hour and minute hands well, you can introduce him to the second.

How to teach a child to determine the time by the clock

In the learning process, it is important to understand that you need to act consistently - from simple to complex.

Show the child the dial you prepared. Tell us that the minute hand moves faster than the hour because the minute passes much faster than the hour. Show that when the minute hand goes through one full revolution, the hour hand shifts only by an intermediate division.

Tell your child about a simple watch. That is, when he goes to bed, pay attention to the time - the big hand is at the number 12, which means that the minutes in the hour are over. So, you need to pay attention to the hour hand - it indicates the number 9. This means that we go to bed at 9 o’clock. At the first stage, specify only the integer values ​​of the hours.

When the child asks what time he will watch cartoons, tell him the exact time, for example, seven hours. Let him try to set the time you indicated on his mock watch.

So that the baby does not lose interest, you can show him how many different clocks exist in the world - sundials, hourglasses, cuckoo clocks, etc. You can learn various verses about the clock.

Focus on the time at which the same actions are repeated daily. For example, in the morning we leave home for kindergarten and work at 8 o’clock, dad arrives at 6 o’clock in the evening, lunch starts at 1 o’clock in the afternoon, it takes two hours to sleep, etc.

You can draw three clock positions on paper — for example, 7 hours, 4 hours, and 10 hours. Sign under each dial: 7 hours - rise, 4 hours - sports section, 10 hours - going to bed. This will make the child pay more attention to hours and time, in addition, sleep will not be a surprise for the baby, he will be mentally prepared for him. In general, such experiments and adherence to a certain regimen make the child more organized, collected and responsible.

When the child will clearly understand the meaning of the whole hours, you can explain to him the minutes and tell what “half past two” means. That is, the hour hand is between the numbers 2 and 3, which means that it’s not two hours, but not three. If the minute hand is 30 minutes (and 30 minutes is half an hour), then the time sounds like half past two. If the child at first says “thirty minutes to three”, there is nothing wrong with that, he just perceived the information, do not correct it, because this is also correct. Then, gradually, he will learn to use the words - half, without a quarter, etc.

When the baby understands the hour and minute well, you can introduce him to the second hand. Explain to your child that the second hand is for short periods of time. This can be shown by example. Ask the child if he can run to the kitchen and back in a minute, if he has time to comb his hair or collect toys? Take time and try to complete a prepared task. Be sure to pay attention to how the minute and hour hands moved, while the second made one full revolution on the dial.

Subsequently, when the kid has mastered the mechanical watch well, you can introduce him to electronic watches, tell them how they work and why they have numbers greater than 12. Be sure to practice your child - you call “a quarter of a second”, and he should set the numbers 1:15 . And vice versa - you name the numbers, and he sets this time on a regular dial.

So, gradually and in stages, you can engage the child in the fascinating world of hours and time. Remember that the best learning is a game in which new information is received with interest and enthusiasm. Teach your child numbers and hours, not only at specific classes. Do this all the time, regularly return to this topic - because we resort to the question of time dozens of times a day.

Do not forget that time is a value that cannot be returned, and it will only depend on you how the child will relate to this valuable resource.

Video: learning to understand the time by the clock