Teaching time is an important and practical life skill that everyone should learn from an early age. There are many ways to practice telling time. The best activities are centered around the daily routine. Here are 30 fun and engaging activities for teaching preschoolers all about time. Kids learn about time through interactive fun activities.
1. Telling Time for Preschoolers
This fun paper plate craft starts with gluing a printable clock and paste it to the plate. Have an adult attach a long hand and shorthand with a brad fastener. Allow kids to color their clocks as they choose. This simple activity begins a wonderful milestone for children.
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2. Paper Plate Clock
Cut out 12 craft foam circles, label 1-12, and glue in order on a paper plate to represent a clock face. Cut short and long hands from construction paper and attach them to the center of the paper plate.
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3. Clock Snack Idea
Using a circular cookie cutter, cut a circle out of a slice of bread. Spread peanut butter on one side of the bread and add 12 M&M's to represent the hours of a clock. Give children two small pieces of celery and have them placed at a given time.
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4. Visual Timetable
The concept of time goes hand in hand with a child's daily schedule. Create a timeline of the time of day activities occur. Print out activities done at specific times of the day and attach them to the wall for all students to see. This is a great way to teach the passage of time and to see the beginning of how to use time management in their day.
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5. What Does the Clock Say?
Print out chart parts to play the game. Students identify time on analog and digital clocks.
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6. Sidewalk Chalk Clock
Draw a giant clock using sidewalk chalk in a large area outside. Have students two at a time work together to show whatever time is called out by moving their bodies around the clock. This is a great way to start with on the hour, half-hour, or quarter-hour.
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7. Make the Time
Using Make the Time printable and clock times that have been laminated or placed in a plastic pouch, have students draw the short and long hands using dry erase markers.
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8. Time Card Sort
Create or print pictures of a variety of activities and have students sort the pictures into categories such as night, day, evening, morning, afternoon, noon, midnight depending either on when the activity takes place. This is a great way to connect time to everyday life.
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9. Build a Clock
To teach time skills to children such as parts of a clock here is a fun and simple activity. Print a build a clock mat. Cut out the numbers for the clock hours and two rectangles for the hour and minute hand.
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10. Time BINGO
This perfect school resource provides measurement of time and other math concepts. Time Bingo is a fun time matching game for teaching about telling time. Print or create bingo cards with time clocks on them. Start with time to the hour for preschoolers and progress to harder times such as half past or quarter to when students are ready.
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11. Time Matching Cards
This fun matching game gives children a great visual aid to practice telling time. Use analog clock puzzle pieces to match digital time puzzle pieces. These printable puzzle pieces make this quick classroom activity.
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12. Clock Matching Game
These educational math games teach about time activities. This matching game is a great way to engage students in learning about time. Students match the digital time clock cards to the analog time clock cards to make correct time matches.
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13. Clock Clothespins
Using 12 clothespins, with the hours on each clothespin. Have students attach clothespins to a paper plate ensuring the correct hour placements. This will quickly become a favorite play time choice.
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14. Easter Egg Telling Time Activity
You will need 24 plastic Easter eggs. Number each egg 1-24. Print out the analog clocks and place one clock inside each egg. Hide the eggs around the classroom and give each student a blank egg sheet. Students will go on an egg hunt and write the correct time on their blank egg sheet. This fun and engaging game about time will have students mastering time quickly.
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15. Printable Watch Time!
Print and have students cut out paper watches. Students can share watches with each other and wear different watches each day. Paper watches provide students with great representations of time.
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16. Timeline of the Day Activity
Make a list of daily routine indicating the time that the activity takes place, such as morning snack time, quiet time, etc. Have students make a clock showing the time of the activity. Students can also draw a picture to go with the activity in the daily routine. This activity is a good way to build a classroom community.
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17. Guess What Time It Is?
This time telling game can be use with the older or new versions of the board game Guess Who? Print the templates to use with the game board, providing students with target time telling abilities. This activity includes telling time worksheets.
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18. Rock Around the Clock
Provide recording sheets for each child or use a dry erase board. Tell the students that you are going to play a song through out the day and each time they hear the song, they will write down the time that they song started. This is a great way to learn about the passing of time. This is a great time to get in some dance moves and allow students to move.
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19. Springtime Flowers
Primary teachers are always looking for great bulletin boards, this is a wonderful interactive board. There are several ways to use this bulletin board, however keeping it simple for young children is best. Create flowers and flower pots attach a clock face on each flower showing different times. Using either premade times or having students write the time on the clock face and attach to the flowerpot.
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20. Clocks by the Cup
Making connections between the hour numbers to the minutes that each number represents is very important. Create this clock by using a large piece of construction paper, 12 small plastic cups and 12 circles cut from construction paper.
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21. Make a Paper Clock
Create this paper clock from either two large circles or construction paper or two paper plate attached together using a brad fastener to the hour and minute hand.
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22. Color the Spaces to Learn the Hours
Teaching kids about time starts with teaching children about the time in between each number on a clock. Print out clocks and have child use highlighters to determine the amount of space on a clock face that belongs to a number.
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23. Make a Hook to Determine the Correct Hour
Teaching correct time when the hour hand is between two numbers, can be difficult. Cut a pipe cleaner in half and curve one end to look like a backwards J. Tape the pipe cleaner to the hour hand, as the hour hand moves, students will be able to determine the hours that the minute hand has already past.
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24. Make a Clock with Linking Math Cubes
This activity helps children learn the measurements of time between each of the numbers. Create a large clock on a piece of cardboard adding the numbers for the hours and the minutes each number represents in minutes. Gather your math cubes and link 5 together to represent how the minute hand moves between each number.
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25. Hula Hoop Clock
Using sidewalk chalk time and a hula hoop on concrete, create a clock face on the ground. Find two sticks, one shorter than the other to represent the hour and minutes hands. Call out times and have the children show the time on the hula hoop clock.
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26. Shake Up a Carton of Clocks
Glue clock faces inside an egg carton. Place an object such as a marble in the carton and shake up the carton. Open the carton and fill in the graph paper with the corresponding time. This educational math game give children the opportunity to graph as well.
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27. Write the Room with I Spy Time
This is a fun and engage time math lesson. Print out several paper analog clocks, number each clock and tape around the room. Create a recording sheet and have students travel around the classroom and record the correct time.
Learn more: I Spy Time
28. Race to Beat the Rush Hour Clock
Gather several Judy clocks and a die for each clock. Give students directions for rolling 1-6 on the die. Starting at a set time like 12:00, have students roll the die until they reach the goal time.
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29. Clock Hats
Cut out construction paper in the shape of a hat and staple or tape the ends together to make a hat. Print out and glue on a clock face on the center on the hat. Attach hour and minute hands to the center of the clock face using a brad fastener. Have students show a specific time on their clock hat. This is a fun way to tell time to the hour in kindergarten.
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30. Learn to Tell Time
An engaging online game for teaching time. In this game, children can set the time on the clock either on a digital or analog clock.
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