Coloured/sectioned clock to help DS understand time

[medievalmadonna]

We are having a LOT of arguments atm because DS doesn't understand the fact that time has passed and it's not possible to do everything every day:

eg get home from school, lunch, homework, play outside/tv, dinner, bed

But it will be different if he has a friend over to play after school - there will not be time for playing outside or tv if he has to do homework once friend has gone. It'll then be time for dinner and bed.

I am fed up of the discussions tbh and need a visual to help him see where we are timewise and that the time actually moves iyswim - just because he hasn't started brushing his teeth, the time when he should have been doing that has moved on and he is now "late".

Anyway, really need recommendations for a clock that will help with this - I think something coloured in segments is what I'm looking for.
They haven't started time at school yet, but should be doing it before Christmas, so something that will help with that too.

DS is 8 and has a speech/language problem (goes to a special school for it), is being assessed for APD next month, and has AD(H)D.
We're not in the UK so need something easily available on amazon.de please!
Thank you :)

I can’t tell you about clocks, as I have only noticed helpful clocks for children in passing in shops.

Does a visual time table, Pecs time line or what is it called (a board of something like Now Next and something else) not work? TBH, DD with a severe language disorder could never understand the time on analogue clocks - and her specialist speech and language school tried to teach her She could only ever read the time on digital clocks. We could use a model clock to show her, the position of the hands now say 4 pm. When the hands are like this, it’s 8 pm, and your favourite television programme will be on. She could then understand the positions of the hands, with regards to what she wanted to happen. Otherwise, it could be 4 centuries for all she knew!

Are you just looking for coloured hour segments?

We have something similar to this to help with the telling of time in a more child friendly way:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kids-Wall-Clock-Learning-Analogue/dp/B08JZFJD57/ref=mp_s_a_1_1_sspa?keywords=kids+wall+clock&qid=1697100313&sr=8-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9waG9uZV9zZWFyY2hfYXRm&psc=1

In addition, maybe something like this would help to manage individual blocks of time for him, they can see the block of time reducing:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/LIORQUE-Rechargeable-Countdown-Classroom-Management/dp/B0CGCCJPR8/ref=mp_s_a_1_2_sspa?keywords=kids+visual+timer&qid=1697100501&sr=8-2-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9waG9uZV9zZWFyY2hfYXRm&psc=1

Use these in conjunction with now/next boards for reinforcement (loads of free printables online or pre-made on Amazon). This is probably what they use at school too. If he needs to brush his teeth or get dressed at a certain time and is struggling then you need to be alongside him at these times, otherwise you’re probably both going to get frustrated.

What about this?

The now and next type thing is useful for what we have planned in the day, but he still doesn't understand the passage of time, that eg he's had his half hour of tv and now we are on the next thing. He doesn't seem to believe in time!

Those are the types of thing I've been looking at. I'd really like one with half hour markings too, but I think I may have to add that in myself.

We have tried many different timers, but I really want something where he can see that the time is moving on even after his allotted segment, iyswim

Does he have a receptive language disorder?

If so, his ability to form concepts is likely to be impaired? Obviously, time is a concept. TBH, DD has never understood time beyond today, yesterday and tomorrow. Anything more than that, and all we can do, is mark it on her calendar and put it in her diary, so she has a visual reminder. She has asked us if there were dinosaurs when we were children - she has never been able to understand the difference between 30 years ago and 300 million (or whenever dinosaurs lived).

I don't know if he has receptive language disorder (will look it up though!); it's just very vaguely described as a language processing problem (I have had to insist on the APD assessment) which makes it very hard to know exactly what will help.
I didn't describe it well before, he doesn't have a problem with the passage of days, weeks, months - it's within the day that he gets totally lost.
He is also going through a phase at the moment - there is a lot of resistance to learning, and he is doing a bit of "this is too hard, I can't do this" even when he absolutely can (and then does). I would just like the time issue to be one thing that we don't have to argue about!

I'm thinking a table clock would probably be better than a wall clock, so that we can move it to whatever room we're in.

There’s a good activity that’s often done with kids when they are learning about time. How much can you do in 1 minute, 5 minutes, 30 minutes etc. you pick an activity and then set a timer and see. Something like this might help though I’d expect to have to do it more than once and to keep reinforcing it.

Another thing you can do is take photos of your child doing all the routine things throughout the day. Not the approximate time, print them off and then get him to help you make a timeline of them all in order with the times underneath.

Time is an abstract thing so it takes lots of kids a while to get used to it.

@openupmyeagereyes that's a great activity idea!

Would a sand timer help? You can get 12 hour ones. Something about physical passing of time?

You can get printable templates where you block in activities on the clock for different times, which might help show that time is passing anyway, and that an activity that runs over or is missed is eating into the next block.

Lots on etsy etc like this one

If the schedule is quite similar each day, or you just want to put the unalterable things like meals or bedtimes on, you can get them printed on actual clock faces as well.

Lots of clocks to teach time-telling also have sections, but some of them can be quite complicated looking if they try to include 24 hours. learn time clock

I taught a child with dyscalculia who found the passage of time difficult, and we made a sort of paper crown, where a strip of paper was divided into the hours of the whole day, and stuck together at the end, with pictures/stickers of activities along. There was something about the shape of that, more in 3D, that allowed her to understand the cyclical nature of time, more easily than seeing a flat clock on paper.

We have a variety of sand timers, which help him to see the passing of time, but at the end he often just wants to turn them over again :D
I haven't seen 12 hour ones, that might be worht looking at.

Thank you for all the suggestions, I'm going to get one of the coloured learning clocks and see if that helps at all. I will print out a chart of activities that corresponds with the colour/time too, so it will seem less abstract to him (I hope)...