Teaching elapsed time can be challenging! It’s a hard concept for elementary students to grasp. However, with the right activities and hands-on experiences, you can make this topic engaging and fun!
In this blog post, we will explore a variety of elapsed time games that will help your students understand this tricky math standard!
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Elapsed Time Game: Travel Around the World
In this whole group elapsed time game, your students will practice their math skills and will learn facts about amazing place around the world.
Break students apart into teams (up to seven different teams). Then, give each team a recording sheet. On your mark, students will go to the first checkpoint on their list and will read the facts about the natural wonder, then solve the elapsed time problem. They’ll show you their answer, and if it’s correct, you’ll give them a location card. The first team that earns all the location cards wins!
Elapsed Time Activity: Let’s Watch a Show!
This activity is a fun way for students to see how many minutes of a show are spent watching commercials.
Choose any school appropriate show you’d like to watch with your students. Record the start time of the show. How many minutes pass until the first commercial? How many minutes are spent watching commercials? Record the end time of the show. How long was the show?
You can also do this activity by listening to a music station in the classroom.
Elapsed Time Line Adventure
Have students create a timeline to visually represent the passage of time for the school day.
Provide them with a set of events and ask them to arrange them in chronological order.
Record start and end times for each event. Calculate the elapsed time for each activity.
Elapsed Time Number Line
Practice calculating elapsed time by using a giant number line.
This is a great tool to use with your visual learners.
You can also use this to complete the above-mentioned activity.
Real-Life Elapsed Time Game for At Home
Bring real-life scenarios into the classroom by providing students with examples of everyday situations that involve elapsed time.
For example, ask them to calculate the amount of time it takes to complete daily activities like brushing teeth, eating breakfast, or traveling to school.
You can assign this activity as homework and then have students discuss and compare their evenings together the next day at school.
Race Against the Clock Elapsed Time Game
Turn elapsed time practice into a fun game by challenging students to solve elapsed time problems against the clock. Set a timer and have students solve as many problems as they can within a given time frame.
This activity not only builds speed and accuracy but also adds an element of excitement to the learning process.
Here are some additional elapsed time games and activities:
Teaching students how to tell time? Check out this blog post!
