This topic is part of the National Curriculum but is not included in the DfE 2020 guidance or the NCETM Mastery PD Materials. There are no NCETM classroom slides to download for this unit. We hope that teachers/schools will plan to cover this material from their own existing high-quality resources and using the information and suggestions below.

National curriculum statutory requirements (p28)

Pupils should be taught to:

• read, write and convert time between analogue and digital 12- and 24-hour clocks
• solve problems involving converting from hours to minutes; minutes to seconds; years to months; weeks to days.

When planning this unit, build on current understanding of time on an analogue clock and a 12-hour digital clock, that children will have developed in Years 1-3 (see unit 11 in Years 1, 2 and 3).

Introducing a 24-hour digital clock

Build on the children’s understanding of the 12-hour digital clock. Consider how to use the knowledge that there are 24 hours in the day and the numbers 13 to 23 to indicate, on a digital clock, how many hours past midnight the time is, without the need to use ‘a.m.’ and ‘p.m.’. You may want to count from 0 to 24 and pause at 12 midday to say that on a 12-hour clock we change from a.m. to p.m. but on a 24-hour clock we use 13, 14 etc. Practice will be needed for children to become fluent that 13:00 is the same are 1 p.m., 14:00 is the same as 2 p.m. etc. Encourage the generalisation that any number for the hours that is 12 or greater is after midday and that any number less than 12 will be before midday. Also to convert from 24-hour to 12-hour, subtract 12 - use the fact that 24-hour time has been created by adding 12 for times that are past midday.

__= 12 + __
13 = 12 + 1 13:00 is the same as 1pm 13 – 12 = 1
14 = 12 + 2 14:00 is the same as 2pm 14 – 12 = 2
15 = 12 + 3 15:00 is the same as 3pm 15 – 12 = 3
etc.

Conversion

Use real-life contexts to encourage children to convert from one unit of time to another. You could use ratio charts to show hours to minutes and minutes to seconds, applying knowledge of the 6 times table and scaling by a factor of 10.

Apply knowledge of the 7 times tables for days and weeks:

Opportunities to address this topic in other Year 4 units in the curriculum prioritisation materials:

• Unit 4: 3, 6, 9 times tables
• Unit 5: 7 times table and patterns
• Unit 6: Understanding and manipulating multiplicative relationships.

Cross-curricular opportunities to address this topic

Throughout the school day refer to when events occur, such as the start and end of the school day, lunchtime etc., increasing awareness from Year 3 by referring to how many minutes past the hour.

Focus on time intervals – for example, how many hours and minutes have passed since break time? Use both analogue and digital clocks.

Continue to support all pupils to know how many days there are in each month. Use opportunities such as writing the date, when you recognise birthdays in your class. Ask questions such as: “Jack’s birthday is on the 29th – which months could this be in? Which months could it not be in?”.

Useful resources

• Online interactive clocks: ITP clock (Mathsframe), Teaching Clock (topmarks.co.uk)
• Teaching telling the time: a non-standard approach. This article, written by a Y3 teacher, reflects on teaching telling the time using an approach she observed in Shanghai
• BBC CBeebies Numberblocks Specials: About Time.