What time is it?

Hello, boys and girls! My name is Bobby.

And my name is Tobby. This is our friend Mobby.

Welcome to our lesson.

Today we have a guest.

It’s a hedgehog.

Hello, everyone. My name is Snoopy.

So what brought you here, Snoopy?

Guys, I came here, because I need your help!

What kind of help do you need?

Well… Listen to my story and you’ll understand everything.

Two days ago I met my friend Lola. She looked so happy!

We were talking when suddenly she exclaimed:

Oh, Snoopy, I forgot to tell you something!

What are you talking about, Lola?

I wanted to invite you to my birthday party, but I forgot to do that. Come to my place tomorrow!

Oh, thank you for your invitation! I’ll come with a great pleasure!

Great! In this case, I will be waiting for you at half to eight.

Okay!

Don’t be late! I won’t celebrate my birthday at home. So when everyone comes, my mum will drive all of us to the restaurant.

Oh, I see! Don’t worry, I won’t be late.

Great! See you!

See you.

Snoopy, we still don’t understand what kind of help you need.

It’s because you need to hear the rest of the story!

Oh, okay. Continue, please!

All right.

I came to Lola’s place. It was half to eight, but I didn’t see anyone! I came closer, knocked at the door, but nobody opened it. Everyone was gone! I was so upset and disappointed!

Guys, tell me, please! Did I do something wrong?

Snoopy, are you sure that you came right on time?

Yes, of course! I looked at my watch. It was 8:30.

Oh, Snoopy, but half to eight is 7:30!

What are you telling me?

Snoopy, I’m just trying to tell you that you were late.

That’s right! You came to Lola’s house at half past eight.

Oh my God! I was sure that I came on time!

Well, Snoopy, it means that you have some problems with telling the time.

Oh, it’s not good!

Don’t worry, Snoopy. We will teach you how to tell the time!

Oh, thank you so much!

So today in the lesson we will:

learn how to tell the time;

And

put the knowledge into practice.

Let’s start! To ask for the time we can use the following questions:

What’s the time?

Or

What time is it?

They both are translated as “Который час?”.

To answer these questions we can use the phrase:

It’s … o’clock.

(This expression is used to refer to the hour as a full hour, without including the minutes).

For example:

It’s one o’clock.

It’s two o’clock.

It’s three o’clock.

It’s four o’clock.

It’s five o’clock.

It’s six o’clock.

It’s seven o’clock.

It’s eight o’clock.

It’s nine o’clock.

It’s ten o’clock.

It’s eleven o’clock.

Or

It’s twelve o’clock.

If we need to show the time of the day, we can use the letters “a.m.” or “p.m.”.

A.m. means “before midday”.

And

P.m. means “after midday”.

Another way to show the time of the day is to use such phrases as in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening or at night.

Look at the following examples and compare them:

It’s seven a.m.

Or we can say:

It’s seven o’clock in the morning.

It’s three p.m.

Or we can also say:

It’s three o’clock in the afternoon.

It’s eight p.m.

Instead of that we can say:

It’s eight o’clock in the evening.

It’s eleven p.m.

Or we can say:

It’s eleven o’clock at night.

If we want to show the minutes, we can use the following constructions:

It’s … past … .

Or

It’s … to … .

Here we need to write the number of the minutes.

Then we use “past” or “to”.

Past is translated as “после”.

To is translated as “до”.

After that we need to write the hour.

If we have from 1 to 30 minutes, we use the word “past”.

If we have from 31 to 59 minutes, we need to use the word “to”.

Past is used to show how many minutes passed after the hour.

And

To is used to show how many minutes left before the hour.

Let’s look at the examples:

It’s twenty minutes past eleven.

It’s ten minutes past seven.

It’s twenty-five minutes past nine.

It’s five minutes past four.

Or

It’s twenty-five minutes to three.

It’s twenty minutes to six.

It’s ten minutes to eight.

It’s five minutes to ten.

Pay attention! Instead of 15 minutes, we can use the word “quarter”. The translation is “четверть”.

And instead of 30 minutes, we can use the word “half”. The translation is “половина”.

Look at the following examples and compare them:

It’s two forty-five.

Or we can say:

It’s quarter to three.

It’s seven thirty.

Or we can say:

It’s half past seven.

We’ve told you how to tell the time.

Now we would like to check your knowledge.

Answer the question:

What time is it?

Let’s check.

It’s nine o’clock.

What time is it?

Check yourselves.

It’s quarter past five.

What time is it?

Let’s check.

It’s ten minutes to eight.

What time is it?

Let’s check.

It’s half past nine.

What time is it?

Check yourselves.

It’s six o’clock.

What time is it?

Let’s check.

It’s twenty minutes to four.

What time is it?

Check yourselves.

It’s quarter to five.

What time is it?

Let’s check.

It’s five o’clock.

What time is it?

Check yourselves.

It’s five minutes past nine.

Well done!

Guys, thank you so much for your help!

You’re welcome, Snoopy.

Now I have to go! I need to apologize to Lola.

Okay. Bye, Snoopy.

Bye, boys!

That’s all for today, our dear friends.

See you soon, boys and girls.