Elapsed Time is Hard for 3rd Graders!

Even after teaching elapsed time for years, it remains one of the hardest topics for 3rd graders to master. Working with multiples of 5, distinguishing between hours and minutes, a.m and p.m., and suddenly 60 is the new whole. 

Luckily, my old teaching partner and I came up with a new strategy for keeping track of elapsed time. As long as kids can count by 1's and 5's, they can do this!




Each mountain represents 1 hour and each molehill represents 5 minutes. Each single tick mark represents 1 minute. So, students count off hours, then 5-minute intervals, then single minutes. After they've reached the finish time, they can easily go back and count up the hours and minutes. 

Some teachers may be using this but I don't know if everyone knows about this so I made a unit just for this skill called Elapsed Time -Mountains and Molehills on TPT.  Check it out - if you have time:)  Elapsed Time Using a Time Line

Penny