Video Transcript
Comparing: Faster, Slower, Earlier,
and Later
In this video, we’re going to learn
how to compare two lengths of time using the words faster and slower. And we’re also going to compare two
times using the words earlier and later.
This tortoise and sloth are about
to have a race. They’re both very slow animals, so
we could be in for a long wait. Let’s make things more
interesting. There we go; perhaps, we’ll be
finished a lot quicker now. At the end of the race, we can see
that it’s taken the tortoise 15 minutes to finish the race. And the sloth has taken 19 minutes
to finish. We can compare these two lengths of
time, 15 minutes and 19 minutes, using the comparing words faster and slower.
Who was faster and who was
slower? Let’s compare the times. We can use 15 cubes to represent 15
minutes and 19 cubes to represent 19 minutes. This helps us to compare the
numbers. And we can see that 15 is less than
19. So, who was faster? We need to think really carefully
here. The animals have done the same
activity; they’ve taken part in a race. So, is the faster animal the one
that takes less time or more time? Well, we know the faster or the
quicker we do something, the less time we take. So, we can say the tortoise was
faster than the sloth. Or we could use the other comparing
word, slower. The sloth was slower than the
tortoise. It took more time to do the same
activity.
So, that’s faster and slower. But there are two more comparing
words we’re going to be using in this video, and these are earlier and later. We know that when something’s
earlier than something else, it happens before it. And if something’s later than
something else, it happens after it. To help us practice these two new
words, let’s have another race. Looks like it’s going to be a slow
one. That’s better. Now, let’s imagine each snail
starts the race at a different time. The blue snail started the race at
seven o’clock. The green snail began at six
o’clock. Now, as we go round the clock face,
the number six comes just before the number seven.
So, if our two snails start racing
at about the same time of day, six o’clock comes before seven o’clock. So now, we can use our comparing
words. Six o’clock is earlier than seven
o’clock. So, we can say the green snail
started earlier. And we can swap it around, use the
word later. Seven o’clock is later than six
o’clock. The blue snail started later. Let’s try answering some questions
now, where we have to practice using these comparing words: faster, slower, earlier,
and later.
In the morning, Matthew and Sophie
started painting at different times. Who started later?
Underneath the question, we’re
shown two different speech bubbles, when Matthew and Sophie tell us the times that
they started painting. Let’s look at them. On Matthew’s clock, the minute
hand, which is the longer hand, is pointing straight up to the number 12. This shows us that it’s an o’clock
time. The hour hand, which is the shorter
hand, is telling us which o’clock it is. It’s pointing to the number
seven. The time Matthew started painting
was seven o’clock.
Now, if we look at the minute hand
on Sophie’s clock, we can see that it’s also pointing to the number 12. Sophie started painting at an
o’clock time too, but the hour hand on Sophie’s clock is pointing to the number
eight. She started painting at eight
o’clock. The first three words of the
question tell us that both of these times are in the morning, and this helps us to
compare the times together.
The question asks us who started
later. In other words, which time comes
after the other, seven o’clock or eight o’clock? We know that the hands of a clock
move in this direction, and so we know seven o’clock comes before eight o’clock. Eight o’clock comes after seven
o’clock. The person who started later was
Sophie.
Matthew and Chloe both started
their work at the same time. Who finished later?
Underneath the question, we can see
a picture of Matthew and Chloe. And both speech bubbles tell us the
times that they finish their work. Let’s look at them one by one. If we look at the minute hand,
which is the long hand on Matthew’s clock, we can see that it’s pointing straight
down to the number six. We know that when a minute hand
points straight up, it’s an o’clock time. And if it’s turned to point to the
number six, we know that it’s made half a turn around the clock. The time must be half past
something, but half past what? Let’s look at the hour hand to find
out.
The hour hand on Matthew’s clock,
which is the shorter hand, isn’t pointing at any numbers. In fact, it’s halfway in between
the four and the five. Do you think that means it’s half
past four or half past five? Well, if we think of the direction
that hands move on a clock, we know that it’s gone past the four, but it hasn’t
quite reached the number five yet. The time is half past four. Now, let’s see what time Chloe
finished her work.
The minute hand on Chloe’s clock is
pointing to the 12. This is an o’clock time. And if we look at the hour hand,
it’s pointing to the four. Chloe finished her work at four
o’clock. Now, our question asks us, who
finished later? Which time comes after the other,
half past four or four o’clock? Well, as we’ve said already, four
o’clock comes first. And the dotted line that we drew on
Matthew’s clock shows us that half past four comes when the minute hand has gone
half the way around the clock. Matthew finished working after
Chloe. Matthew finished later.
Daniel and Victoria both started
getting ready at the same time. Who got ready faster?
You know, if we want to compare
whether someone is faster or slower, it’s very important to know when someone starts
doing something and when they finish. In this question, we’re told that
Daniel and Victoria both start getting ready at the same time. This means we don’t need to worry
about the start time. We can think of it as being a
little bit like a race to get ready. They both started at exactly the
same time. So, what matters is what time they
finished.
Now, if we look at the clocks that
are underneath the question, we can see the time that both children finished getting
ready. And there is something interesting
about those times. Can you see it? The minute hand, which is the
orange hand on both clocks, the long hand, is pointing to the number six. This means that since it was an
o’clock time, it’s gone half the way around the clock face. In other words, these are both
half-past times.
Now, if we begin with Daniel’s
clock and we look at the hour hand, which is the shorter hand, we can see that it’s
between the numbers eight and nine. In other words, it’s gone past the
number eight, and it’s on its way to number nine. But it hasn’t got there yet. This shows the time half past
eight. On Victoria’s clock, the hour hand
is halfway between the seven and the eight. It’s gone past the seven, but it
hasn’t reached the eight yet. The time is half past seven. Now, we know that Victoria’s time
is earlier than Daniel’s time because half past seven comes before half past
eight. We could also say that Daniel
finished later than Victoria because half past eight is later; it comes after half
past seven.
But this question doesn’t want us
to use words like earlier and later; it asks us who got ready faster. Now, this is where we really need
to think carefully. If both children started getting
ready at the same time, would you expect the child who gets ready faster, the person
who does it really quickly, to finish earlier or later? We’d expect them to finish
earlier. We can imagine Victoria, who’s
already got ready, tapping her watch and saying, “Come on, Daniel, hurry up!” The person who finished faster is
the person who finished earlier. And that person is Victoria.
So, what’ve we learned in this
video? We’ve learned how to compare two
lengths of time using the words faster and slower. We’ve also learned how to compare
times using the words earlier and later.