• Display the cards showing 7:00, 7:30, 8:00
• “_______ put their clocks in this order. Why do you think they did that?” (The hour hand is moving from the 7 to the 8 and on the middle clock, it’s in between.)
• “On the second clock, the hour hand is halfway between the 7 and the 8, so we can name the time as ‘half past 7.’”
• Write the times on the cards, but do not add the minute hand.
• “Hold up the card that shows half past 3. Hold up the card that shows half past 12.”

• “Can you show me how the arrow hand moves around the clock? Start at the 12.”
• “Which number do you say first when you count from 1 to 12? Which number does the hour hand pass by first on its way around the clock?”

• Display the clock showing half past 2.
• “Mai says it’s half past 2, and Tyler says it’s half past 3. Who do you agree with? Why do you agree with them?” (I agree with Mai, because the hour hand is past 2, but not past 3. It looks like it’s pointing in between 2 and 3. If it was half past 3, the hour hand would be pointing in between 3 and 4.)

The purpose of this activity is for students to connect their understanding of half of a circle to the minute hand moving halfway around the face of a clock (MP7). Students watch a display clock to see that as the minute hand goes around the clock, the hour hand goes from one hour to the next. In the Activity Synthesis, students add the minute hand to their half-past clock cards. In the next lesson, students will connect the term “half past” to 30 minutes to write times in hours and half hours.

Use a display clock set to 10:00 to move the minute hand around until the clock shows 11:00. If a display clock is not available, this video can be used.

• “When the minute hand moves all the way around the circle, a whole hour has passed. The hour hand moves from one hour to the next. When the minute hand moves halfway around the clock—from the 12 to the 6—the hour hand moves halfway from one hour to the next.”
• “Let’s put the minute hand on our new half-past clock cards.”