Interactive teaching clock for the whiteboard

What the interactive teaching clock does on screen

One big clock face on the board, with the controls a time lesson needs along the top and a black bar of in-lesson buttons along the bottom. It stands still until you ask it to run, so it holds whatever time you leave it on while you talk.

• The hands. Drag either one, and the nearest to your finger is the one that moves. Take the minute hand past the 12 and the hour goes with it. Drag the short hand on its own and the minute hand comes to match, so the pair always show a time a real clock could show.
• What it tells you. Under the face, the time in digits and in words, written the way we say it, so 9:23 reads as twenty-three minutes past nine.
• Both, Analogue, Digital. Both shows face and reading. Analogue hides the reading behind Reveal. Digital shows only large digits, for a class drawing the hands.
• The face itself. Numerals 1 to 12, Roman or off. Ticks turns the sixty small marks on and off. Minutes adds a second ring reading 05, 10, 15 and round.
• Hand key and To / past. Hand key colours the hour hand navy and the minute hand red. To / past shades the right half green and the left half orange.
• Setting a time. Type one in and press Set, or press Random for a time at your chosen level: o'clock, half past, quarters, five minutes, or any minute at all. The hands sweep round to it the right way rather than jumping, so the class watches them travel. O'clock, Quarter past, Half past and Quarter to are one press each, Nudge steps by 1, 5 or 15 minutes and by the hour, and 24h reads 21:35 rather than 9:35 PM.
• Estimate, then Reveal. Random hides the reading. Take an answer, type it in the box in either words or digits, and Reveal replies in the same words: "You said half past three. It is twenty to four."
• Tick and Speed. Tick runs the clock at real time with a second hand sweeping round. Speed runs a minute a second, so a whole hour goes by in one. Press again to stop.
• Second clock. A start and an end side by side, with the gap between them underneath in hours and minutes. Tap a face to choose which one you are setting.
• Blank face and Print. Blank face takes every number off in one press for a read-the-hands task. Print gives you one A4 landscape sheet of the face as it stands.

How to use it in a lesson

Set the level before the children are looking and leave it there. Random follows it, so a class working on quarter past never gets handed twenty-seven minutes to four by accident.

1. Choose the direction. Analogue with Reveal asks the class to read a clock. Digital asks them to build one, with a child dragging the hands before you switch back and check.
2. Press Random and wait. Take three answers before you touch Reveal. The wrong ones are the lesson.
3. Turn one scaffold on, not three. The minutes ring for a class still counting in fives, the hand key for one muddling the hands, To / past for one stuck after half past.
4. Take it away in the same session. Three times with the minutes ring on, three with it off. That gap shows who was reading and who was copying.
5. Use Nudge for duration. Set a start time, press +15 while the class counts, and ask what it will say before you press.
6. Print the board if the time you have just argued about is worth keeping.

Ideas by year group

• Year 1. Both, o'clock, Hand key on. Drag the long hand all the way round and watch what the short one does.
• Year 2. Analogue, half past. Random, read it together, Reveal. Then ask why the hour hand is not pointing at a number.
• Year 3. Analogue, quarters, Minutes ring on. How far has the long hand travelled from the top, and how do you know without counting in ones?
• Year 4. Analogue, five minutes, To / past on. Is this past or to, and can you tell before you count?
• Year 5. Both, 24h, to the minute. Read it as a 24 hour time. What would it say on a bus timetable?
• Year 6. Both, Roman numerals, 24h. Set 14:50 and ask what it will be in thirty-five minutes, then step there with Nudge.

The misconceptions it helps with

The hour hand standing still. Children draw it pointing straight at a number whatever the minutes say. Here it creeps with the minute hand, so at half past it is plainly halfway between two numbers and nobody has to be told.

Reading the minute hand as a number. With the minute hand on the 4, plenty of children say four minutes past. Turn the Minutes ring on, 20 appears next to the 4, and the argument is over.

Counting past the half. Twenty to seven gets read as forty past six, or as twenty past seven. The shaded halves show which side the hand is on, and which hour the time belongs to.

Thinking the face knows morning from evening. It does not. Leave the hands alone and press 12h then 24h. The face does not change at all.

Frequently asked questions