The concept of time: how to teach it and why it's difficult |

A. Why is it important to teach children the concept of time?

The importance of understanding and managing time is everywhere. Children have to know and respect their schedules at school, bedtime, mealtimes, playdates, birthdays. Not understanding time and how it works is a major setback from many of the daily life activities for autistic and special needs children and adults.

When the child is able to understand and answer when questions, that means he has a good grasp of the concept of time. This means that as an adult, he will:

be less reliant on others
have more options and opportunities for activities
be more successful in life both professionally and socially
be able to prioritize and properly plan actions and tasks.

B. Why do children with autism or special needs struggle to understand the concept of time?

Children with autism or special needs, in general, might struggle with the concept of time for many reasons:

1. Inability to recall recent events

Children with poor working memory are less able to consistently recreate time intervals, which can affect the ability to recall recent events. This also impairs their ability to plan and multitask which makes understanding time even more confusing.

2. Attention-deficit

Attention deficit may also affect the perception of time. Research shows that individuals with ADHD lack the ability to perceive time accurately. This makes it hard for them to do things in order/sequence and to estimate the right time it takes to complete a task.

3. Communication and cognitive impairment

Having trouble perceiving the passage of time could underlie some of the communication and cognitive impairments that characterize children with autism and other special needs. For example, even tiny delays in the perception of speech, or the imprecise pairing of spoken words and gestures could lead to the inability to precisely measure the passing time.

Unfortunately, being unable to understand the concept of time and learn to manage time properly leads, in adulthood, to problems with deadlines, punctuality, and to poor multitasking and planning. All of which are crucial to success in relationships and at work.

C. How to teach the concept of time?

Time itself is an abstract notion, which makes it hard to understand for children with special needs. In order to teach them the concept of time, we have to find ways to make it more concrete, tangible, and visual.

1. Fun activities to teach time-related vocabulary

Here are some activities you can work on with your child in order to teach the concept of time passing, using household items and fun activities for later recall and discussion:

1.1 Talk about an activity to others

You can for example guide your child to make a painting or drawing and show it to the family and friends. Emphasize when it was done (yesterday, this morning…), how much time and effort it took to finish, and the different steps that had to be completed in order to make that painting or drawing.

1.2 Use fun activities to teach time-specific vocabulary

Baking a cake is such a fun activity to teach time-related vocabulary and expressions such as: make sure you wash eggs before…., now that we have …, after, now we wait 20 minutes for the muffins to bake, etc. The baking process can be used as a concrete example to teach the child sequencing, that time is passing, and that we can measure it.

Other fun activities include building a sandcastle, art and craft activities, washing clothes in the washing machine, etc.

1.3 Use timers to time daily activities.

You can use digital or sand timers to time some daily activities such as washing hands teeth. This can practically show your child how time is passing. You can also time how much he played in the playground or how much it took for him to put on his shoes.

1.4 Use videos, books, and stories to teach sequences.

These books and stories should have a clear beginning, middle, and end to make it easy for your child to understand the concept of time. It would be very helpful to use vocabulary such as: before, then, after, first, finally, only then, etc.

Watch videos and use them exactly as you used books to teach the child sequencing. Try to use the same vocabulary as before (before, after, then, etc.)

1.5 Use apps to practice time-related vocabulary

Here are some examples of apps that can be used to teach causality or sequencing:

Use these apps to practice time-related vocabulary such as clock, am and pm, day, delay, early, every day, before, now, later, morning, evening, overtime, etc.

1.6 Use a visual schedule

This can be a fun and efficient way for your child to navigate his daily routines without frustration. It’s also a good opportunity to teach him about sequencing and ordering his daily tasks and measuring time.

A visual schedule shows the passage of time throughout the day. When a task or an activity is done, putting a check sign in front of it is a great way to signal that the time has passed and that the task is over.

Here is a free and fun printable for a visual schedule that you can use with your child:

Visual Picture Schedule For Home & Daily Routines

2. Sorting activities to teach the concept of time

There are many strategies to teach time to children with autism or special needs. Sorting is a fun and easy strategy to teach time-appropriate activities.

2.1 Sorting by daytime and nighttime

We want to start with this easy sorting activity since it is easy for children to differentiate between light and dark.

In this exercise, the child has to sort 24 activities into two categories (daytime and nighttime).

It is preferable to start sorting 4 (obvious) items only, in the beginning, then make the exercise progressively more challenging as the child understands what’s expected of him.

Here are some examples of activities classified by day and night:

Daytime activities

having breakfast
playing in the playground
going to school
visiting family
going to the doctor
Going to the beach
Playing video games
Baking a cake
going to the waterpark
going to the library or bookshop
cleaning up

Nighttime activities

Eating dinner
Doing homework
Putting on Pajamas
Sleeping
taking a bath
Reading a book
laying down in bed
playing in bed
having a sleepover
telling stories
playing board games with family

You can print the sorting by daytime and nighttime file below in the download section.

2.2 Sorting by season

Sorting events by season is a fun activity to teach the concept of time. It is definitely more complex than daytime and nighttime sorting and requires some vocabulary and classification abilities.

In this activity, children learn to make a connection between activities and the season they occur in.

This is an entirely different exercise from the one in which we sort objects or items by season. In this exercise, the child has to focus his attention on activities and events related to a specific season in order to understand the temporal context in which these activities happen.

Here are some examples :

Summer activities

Eating ice cream
going to the beach
go to the swimming pool
visiting the waterpark
eating watermelon
playing with the sand

Autumn or fall activities

collecting leaves
taking a walk in the park with orange leaves
playing with dead leaves
cleaning up dead leaves
making pumpkin soup
making fall craft

winter activities

skying
watching the snow
playing with snowballs
making a snowman
jumping in puddles
walking in the rain

Spring activities

going on a picnic
gardening
reading a book outside
hiking in the green forest
painting flowers
smelling flowers

You can download the pdf file for this sorting activity in the download section below.

2.3 Sorting by morning, afternoon, evening, and night

This is also a fun activity to practice more extensively sorting activities by the time of the day we do them. The child can sort activities by:

morning activities like making the bed, brushing hair, or dressing up for school
afternoon activities like for example having lunch or taking a nap
evening activities like having a snack, doing homework, or going on a playdate
and night activities such as taking a bath or reading a bedtime story

3. When question flashcards

Practicing When flashcards is a great way to refine the work done on the concept of time. It’s also a great opportunity to make sure your child is fully aware of the passing time, sequencing, and causality.

You can download when question flashcards here:

Free WHEN questions Task Cards for speech therapy

Download free activities for the concept of time

The concept of time – sorting activities by daytime and nighttime.pdf

The concept of time – sorting activities by season.pdf

For durable materials, use a laminating machine to laminate the pdf file and velcro on the sorting objects and mats to make it easy to use and store this activity.

Keep in mind that even if it might take your child a long time to fully understand the concept of time, once he does, it will have a huge impact on the quality of his life.