Great Britain’s school clocks are going digital because many of the students reportedly can’t tell time using traditional analogue clocks – you know, the ones with two hands pointing to 12 numbers circling the dial.
Roman numerals or Big Ben with no numbers on its four faces must really freak them out.
Younger generations have been raised in a world where everything is digital, so the seemingly simple task of telling the time on a clock has been taken for granted, Today reported.
Now, students accustomed to telling the time from digital devices are getting worked up in the classroom during tests because they can’t figure out how much time they have left before having to hand in their work. Those darn old-fashioned clocks.
Malcolm Trobe, deputy general secretary at the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), said this was causing unnecessary stress among students and that schools were trying to make situations "as easy and straightforward as possible” come exam time, The Telegraph reported.
"You don’t want them to put their hand up to ask how much time is left,” Trobe said.
“Schools will inevitably be doing their best to make young children feel as relaxed as they can be. There is actually a big advantage in using digital clocks in exam rooms because it is much less easy to mistake a time on a digital clock when you are working against time.”
This is not the first time the topic has come up and it’s not an issue limited to children in the U.K.
A study last year found that four out of five Oklahoma City students couldn’t read a clock and that only one in ten children aged between six and 12 owned a watch, the Daily Mail reported.
Curious whether the news was true, Jimmy Kimmel took to the streets to conduct his own experiment on Tuesday’s night’s episode of "Jimmy Kimmel Live!"
Children were presented with clocks and asked to tell what the time was but, according to Time (no pun intended), most were unable to provide an accurate answer to interviewers.
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