Children have difficulty with the concept of time. When they make their own "clock" they can begin to understand that clocks are a way for people to measure time and find out how much time has passed since something began or how much time they have to wait before something begins.

Materials:

• Two paper cups
• Sand
• Sharp Pencil

Directions:

To begin, show your child different clocks and talk about some of the ways you use them. To make a sand clock, fill a paper cup with sand. Use a sharp pencil to poke a hole in the bottom of a second paper cup. Cover the hole with your finger and pour the sand into the cup with the hole. Move your finger and show your child how the sand runs through the hole into the other cup.

Explain that people can measure time by counting how long it takes for all the sand to run out. Sift the sand through the second cup again, you and your child can count until all the sand is in the first cup.

Then use the sand clock to measure how long it takes your child to do something, such as

• Say the alphabet.
• Jump in place 20 times.
• Sing a song.

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