Lesson 12
Hours, Minutes, and Seconds
Lesson Purpose
The purpose of this lesson is for students to use multiplication to describe the relationship between units of time and to express larger units of time in terms of smaller ones.
Lesson Narrative
In grade 2, students learned to tell time to the nearest five minutes and recognized that there are 60 minutes in 1 hour. In grade 3, they learned to tell time to the nearest minute and to measure intervals of time. Students may also know that there are 60 seconds in a minute. In this lesson, students see the relationship between hours and minutes and between minutes and seconds in multiplicative terms. They then use their new insights to convert hours into minutes and minutes into seconds.
- Engagement
- MLR8
Learning Goals
Teacher Facing
- Describe the multiplicative relationships between units of time.
- Express hours in terms of minutes and seconds.
Student Facing
- Let’s explore time in hours, minutes, and seconds.
Required Preparation
Lesson Timeline
| Warm-up | 10 min |
| Activity 1 | 20 min |
| Activity 2 | 15 min |
| Lesson Synthesis | 10 min |
| Cool-down | 5 min |
Teacher Reflection Questions
How did previewing the cool-down ahead of time help you synthesize the learning that took place in the lesson?
Suggested Centers
- Would You Rather? (2–5), Stage 2: Compare to Smaller Units (Addressing)
- Compare (1–5), Stage 3: Multiply within 100 (Supporting)