Telling the Time

Objective & content

This poster teaches how to tell the time with 20 model sentences in four colour-coded groups, such as It's half past four. and It's a quarter to five. By the end, A1 students can say the time on the hour, minutes past, minutes to, and with a.m. or p.m.

Pedagogical guide

English counts minutes past the hour up to 30 and then minutes to the next hour, which students often find harder than the French pattern suggests. Teach o'clock first, then past, then to, using the 4:05 to 4:55 examples as a fixed sequence. Leave the a.m. / p.m. group and the digital reading (two fifty-nine) for a later short lesson.

Suggested procedure

1. (5 min) Set a clock to the hour and drill It's seven o'clock.
2. (10 min) Move the hands from five past to half past; students say the sentence each time you stop.
3. (10 min) Repeat for the to group and remind students to count back from the next hour.
4. (5 min) Say a digital time such as 4:45; students answer with the full sentence.

Adaptations

[S] Practise only o'clock, half past and a quarter past / to.

[A] Students describe their school day with times and a.m. / p.m., as in My lesson is at ten past twelve.

Materials & prerequisites

Print at A3 portrait. A clock with movable hands helps. Students need numbers from 1 to 60. The poster has French hints but no exercises and no key.