One of the first things we talk about with elapsed time is how it's almost like the hour hand is doing 'laps' around the clock face. We talk about how the minutes around the clock can be thought of as a number line...imagine there was a number line tape that went around the clock that we could pull off & lay flat in front of us. Of course, it's also continuous...once we get to 60, it starts back at 1 all over again!
We've got those ideas, but figuring out elapsed time continued to be a struggle. You all know that I am a firm believer in the power of games in instruction. I love, love, love using games in the classroom! So-- I went on the search....I was super excited when I came across Laura Candler's Racing Through Elapsed Time! Perfect!!

One thing that I especially like is that it is a game in which ALL the players are involved - no one person at a time takes a card while the others wait. The leader reads the game card, and ALL students work on the problem on their whiteboards. Those who got the correct answer roll the die & move their game piece. (How brilliant is that!? I'm not sure that I've ever seen a game where ALL of the kiddos were working all the time! Brilliant) You can see in the picture to the right that they're working at the same time.
Of course, THE most important thing is that it was effective! I noticed as we continued playing that the kiddos were becoming more and more comfortable working on elapsed time questions (and that they were coming up with the correct answers more frequently and more quickly! Win! Win!). In fact, one of my kiddos actually said, "Hey! This is getting pretty easy!" True story!

Just click on the link below to head over & check this out for yourself!

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