Skill: Tell time to the nearest 5 minutes

Explanation and Free Practice Resources

Reading time to the nearest five minutes means interpreting the positions of the hour and minute hands on an analog clock: each successive numeral represents another five-minute interval, while the hour hand shows the current hour and its progress toward the next. The learner connects these clock-face readings with digital notation, such as 7:35, and distinguishes the hour from the minutes; reading individual minutes, using 24-hour notation, and calculating elapsed time are outside this scope.

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Detailed Explanation: Tell time to the nearest 5 minutes

To tell time to the nearest 5 minutes, look at the two hands:

The short hand is the hour hand.
The long hand is the minute hand.
Count by fives around the clock. Each number tells another 5 minutes:

1=5,\quad 2=10,\quad 3=15,\quad \ldots,\quad 7=35

Example: The minute hand points to $7$ , and the hour hand is between $7$ and $8$ .

The hour hand is still in the $7$ o’clock hour, so the hour is $7$ .
The minute hand points to $7$ . Counting by fives gives:

7 \times 5=35

So the minutes are $(35)$ .

Write the hour first, followed by the minutes:

\boxed{7{:}35}

The time is 7:35.

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Time - Telling - Clock to Words - Five Minutes

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