4 Out of 5 Kids in This Oklahoma City School Can't Read Analog Clocks - Neatorama

What time is it? Don't ask kids ages 6 to 12 in one Oklahoma City school to read analog clocks, because chances are, they can't.

Caitlin Carnes of Boys & Girls Club at Santa Fe South Elementary was working to teach kids in after-school program, when she realized that 4 out of 5 kids didn't have any ideas on how to read analog clocks:

"I think the exposure to technology, everyone's so used to seeing digital," Carnes told KFOR. "They all have cell phones and tablets so they don't have to look at a clock very often that's analog."

My kids didn't even need to look at digital clocks - they just ask Siri what time it is ...

(Image by JuergenG)

I don't know if it's related, but a certain 10 year old I know cannot comprehend "quarter past", e.g., 12:15. She says that it means 12:25. When I try to show her an analog clock face and ask her to divide it into quarters, she just looks at me as if I grew a third head...

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The school is around 98% Latino. I'm not saying it could be because of race, but there could be some cultural stuff going on. Carnes even suggests in the article that some countries use military time.
Anyway, the original article doesn't say if the 150 students were only from that school or if it was throughout the city.

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Analog is easier on the brain. A quick glance can even clue you in as to how much time you have left to complete a task. Then again, I bet not many could even read a sun dial or know how to tell time on a sunlit day w/o a watch.

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Drawing a clock face is still a component of mini-mental-status exams in tests of cognitive impairment such as the Saint Louis University Mental Status Exam. I have wondered whether this component needs to be modified.

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Funny you mention that. I learned a while back that in Ontario Canada, that is used to "test" older folks who wish to renew their driver's license. Wondered if someone just drew boxes with numbers in them would pass.

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I don't remember "How to read a clock" being curricula in my kindergarten class. Including the younger grades probably skews the numbers, and I bet going back 20 years wouldn't have netted much better results...

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