Now, let's take a look at a little more of this "time telling" thing.  Remember, when we tell time in Spanish, 1) we select either es or son, depending upon whether it's 1:00-1:59 or 2:00-12:59, respectively; 2) we select either la or las, the definite article, feminine, again depending upon whether it's 1:00-1:59 or 2:00-12:59, respectively; and, finally, 3) we select the correct numbers to denote the horas and the minutos representing the time of day.  There are a couple of other things that we can use to "tighten up" and "expand" our ability to "tell time" in the Spanish language.

Just like we say "It's a quarter to three" or "It's half-past six" or "It's ten to eight," Spanish has some of the same "shortcuts."

In Spanish, just like in English, the hours on a clock face are divided into not just minutes, but into "quarters" and into "halves" (or "halfs" if you talk like I do!! — can't even speak my own language half the time { no pun intended! } ).   The words we use for these time measurements are cuarto and media, the first for "one-quarter" and the second for "half." These are words we use in other life-contexts too, so it is worth your time to learn and "see" them for what they mean.  Cuarto is the word we use to denote a "room" or a "bedroom," among other things, and media or medio — it is an ADJECTIVE after all!! — is a the word we use to describe "half" of a whole lot of things in this life: "half a gallon of milk, half-full tank of gas, have an idiot. . . ." So, it is worth your time to commit these words to memory, right? Anyway, let's get back to "telling time." Here's how we JAZZ UP our "time telling" skills using a couple of fomulae ( that's the plural of the word formula, the plural isn't formulas ! ):

"It's a quarter past three"

Ser + definite article + hour number + y cuarto

Son las tres y cuarto

and another example of how they (and we!) "tell time":

"It's half-past three"		Ser + definite article + hour number + y media		Son las tres y media

and one more final example of JAZZIN' UP the "telling of time":

"It's a quarter to four"

Ser + definite article + hour number + menos cuarto

Son las cuatro menos cuarto

or it can be said using the minute number (quince) rather than the cuarto — Son las cuatro menos quince. Either way is fine, either is totally understandable to Spanish-speaking folks. As long as we're on the subject of "quarter to. . . ." let's look at one more example of how we "tell time" when the minute hand is passed the 30 minute mark on the face of the clock.

"It's twenty to four"

Ser + minute + preposition + definite article + hour

Son veinte (minutos) para las cuatro

Really, "telling time" in the Spanish language isn't all that much different from how we do it in English, we just have to use different sounds ( which form ‘words' ) to answer the question "What time is it?"

There is one more important and useful bit of information about "telling time" that you will need to know and understand. You will remember that in the last example we were saying Son veinte (minutos) para las cuatro or "It's twenty minutes to four." Here's what you want to remember:  the thirty-minute mark on the clock face is a solid, unpassable wall for this last way of "telling time." What I mean is, if it is 3:25, you CANNOT use this last formula and say Son treinta y cinco minutos para las cuatro or "It's thirty-five minutes to four".  We normally don't tell time like that in English, do we? We don't do it in Spanish either! So, it's OK to say Son veinte y nueve minutos para las cuatro . . . Son veinte y ocho minutos para las cuatro . . . and so on all the way up Es un minuto para las cuatro (altho' we'd more likely say Son las cuatro menos uno ) in this last instance. Now, if you were a disc jockey, you'd find a bunch of different ways to tell your audience the time of day, just to keep it interesting. You know how they do it:  "It's three o'clock with ten minutes" or "It's ten past the hour of three" or "We're fifty minutes away from the four o'clock drive time" and so on. The same thing happens with the locutores on the radio stations throughout the Spanish-speaking world.

But, for right now, let's stick with the most basic of ways to "tell time," OK? Now, let's head back to the clock worksheets and see if we can't write some of the answers using this new information about "telling time."

Back to "Telling time" Lectura 1

On to "Clock, clocks, and more clocks. . . ."