Do you automatically know how to convert the time to military hours?

[GoldenHours]

At work we always have to refer to military time/a 24 hour clock. I often see people having to count with their fingers to what the time is (e.g. counting that 8pm is 20:00). Similarly, with months I see people having to count with their fingers what number month it is when writing the date (e.g. counting to see that August is the 8th month).

Do you know the time in 24 hours and the number of the months off-by-heart or do you have to count it?

I know 24 hour clock off by heart, actually I prefer it.

I always have to stop for a second and think about months though.

Easily. I have dyscalculia and have no issues as it’s imbedded in my memory.

Yes of course!
Do people really not know this? My phone is in 24 hour format /military time
Odd question tbh

Well I'm clearly in a minority. I changed the time on my phone from the 24 hour clock because I cannot easily work out the time. I have to really think about it.

I don't use the phonetic alphabet correctly either.

24h clock fine, months fine, phonetic alphabet I constantly panic on the phone at work and say daft things "w for watermelon".

Yes. Years of medical rota design means it's drilled into my brain. Same with knowing how many hours a shift is and how long the rest periods between shifts is, just by seeing start and finish times. Not an especially useful skill

@ErrolTheDragon

I have the (very possibly incorrect) impression that the USA is even more 'imperial' than we are, whereas continental Europe is firmly metric.

American scientists use metric (of course), but quite a lot of their engineering seems to be in their version of imperial 'American Customary Units'. They have some quite odd units (slugs and kips) and apparently rate the electrical resistance of wire using a mix of SI and customary - ohms per thousand feet.

not only are they "more" imperial (I buy stuff from over there, and lived there for a while)....their pints and gallons line up with their pounds and onces...so 16 ounces to a pint instead of 20, but still 8 pints to a gallon. My last car but two was a Suzuki Jimney and I thought the miles to a full tank was dire till I realised that the tank size was quoted in the manual as american gallons but the MPG was in UK gallons....and then cookery is done in cups BUT there are both imperial cups (1 cup equals half an american pint) and legal cups which are metric and slightly smaller. I think and work in any depending on the size of the original material or the units of the recipe.

The time comes automatically for me, but not always the months.

I can do the 24hr clock very easily but I'm afraid I'm an outlier for the months and have to finger-count them, probably because Sept = 7, Oct = 8, Nov = 9, Dec = 10 and the two systems seem to be fighting it out in my head.

Also I've no idea if 'midnight on Monday' means very late Sunday evening / very early Monday morning or very late Monday evening. I share a lot of job adverts and this is a perennial problem, always glad to see "23:59" wheeled out.

I know that there are settings I can learn about and then implement to solve the difficulties that arise where 'ordering by date' fights with file-naming conventions (particulary when using UK's DD/MM/YYYY) I have to say that my shorthand workaround has solved things for me. In case it helps others: Anuary, Bebruary, Charm, Dapril, Ey, Fune, Guly, Haugust, Iptember, Joctober, Movember, Zecember. Yes really. Obviously you have to do month first then day as 01, 07, 12 etc and everything lines up perfectly ;)

Jo

when digital time pieces came in, it was said that analogue ones would vanish apart from antiques and the skill of analoge time telling would vanish...until it was realised that analogue time pieces are much easier to read at a distance.
Oh and no one has mentioned ship's time told by bells....I can do that too and have got a clock that chimes bells and also have an app on my phone. That is used because its dark on the ships bridge at night and needs to be to keep watch, and the chime mechanism is much simpler than hours and quarter hours.....

@Kite22

Of course. All adults should be able to do this without even thinking about it.

Why ?
There must be loads of things I've 'learned' at some point in my life, but if you don't ever use them, why would they be instant recall ?
There is no 'should' about it. People have different headspace and most of us prioritise things we use over things we don't.

But people do use the 24 hour clock every day!

‘Military time’ is how many Americans refer to the 24h clock.

I don’t have to convert it, I just know and I think most people do. My kids were taught it early in primary school.

Yes but I grew up in a country where 24 hour clock is used. It took my much longer to remember and pm I used to say 19.00 not 7 pm

@LoislovesStewie

Yes, and I always use the NATO phonetic alphabet if I need to spell something. (The proper one that is A-alpha not A -apple etc)

My DS7 learned this in Beavers and uses it all the time. It's useful to learn the official version rather than trying to think of a random word beginning with W when you need one!!

Time I wouldnt use fingers.
Some months I would use fingers. It all goes wrong because OCTober should be 8, and it's not.

I bought some photo frames in TK Maxx the other day. They were American brands and had their sizes in inches written in them. I measured them all in cm before going online to order prints and was totally flummoxed to find that Bonusprint (U.K. website) only sold prints in inches!

(I don’t buy photos very often. I am totally used to heights and weights of people in imperial but I do everything else in metric -born in the 1970s.)

Sat 28-Aug-21 09:36:58
Kite22
Of course. All adults should be able to do this without even thinking about it.

Why ?
There must be loads of things I've 'learned' at some point in my life, but if you don't ever use them, why would they be instant recall ? confused
There is no 'should' about it. People have different headspace and most of us prioritise things we use over things we don't.

But people do use the 24 hour clock every day!

everybody?

The 24 hour clockk isnt military, loads of places use it, train/bus/air timetables.....nothing difficult about it. Just practice using it.

Just taught my 11 year old as I use it as I’m a nurse so use it all the time so he was interested. It’s not military time just 24 hour clock and I learned at school it’s not difficult (for me) - am dyslexic/dyscalculia and crAp at numbers. I do understand that not everyone is good at everything though so some will struggle with it if they don’t use it often

I remember learning the 24 hour clock at primary school way back in the 70s. I definitely use it every day. I think it’s quite rare to see something like 7pm as opposed to 19:00.

I expect that people in certain professions and those who’ve spent a lot of time travelling by public transport (so used to looking at timetables) are more familiar with the 24hr clock.

24 hour clock no problem after long hours pretending I was at the Chalet School as a child
The phonetic alphabet on the other hand... I used 'S' for sun and 'N' for noo-noo the other day to give my postcode as my mind went blank.

Yes, although I'd also call it the 24-hr clock. I like how @BrushMySmush puts it - like speaking two languages fluently - that's how it is for me.

@Bloatstoat

24 hour clock no problem after long hours pretending I was at the Chalet School as a child The phonetic alphabet on the other hand... I used 'S' for sun and 'N' for noo-noo the other day to give my postcode as my mind went blank.

@Bloatstoat ooo another chalet fan!

@Kite22

Of course. All adults should be able to do this without even thinking about it.

Why ?
There must be loads of things I've 'learned' at some point in my life, but if you don't ever use them, why would they be instant recall ?
There is no 'should' about it. People have different headspace and most of us prioritise things we use over things we don't.

Well unless you have a specific difficulty such as dyslexia dyscalculia or other learning issues, then surely everyone else over the age of about 6 or so should be able to learn things off by heart. I can still recite a poem I learned in infants' school over 50 years ago.

That way, whether you use it frequently, occasionally or almost never, there should be automatic recall. It should be ingrained and automatic.

I did notice when my dc were at school, that they never seemed to be told that they had to memorise things. Perhaps that's part of the problem.