This week in science we’re answering the question: “Who set the first clock?” We made shadow clocks (sundials), learned about telling time by the Sun, and found out how (and why) people first divided the day into hours.

When your child brings the sundial home, you could help set it up in the sun with the north-pointing arrow pointing to north. When you and your child watch the shadow move over the course of the day, you might point out that the shadow moves clockwise around the dial.

That’s no coincidence. The first clockmakers patterned the movement of the clock hands on what people were used to: the shadow clock. And here’s a fun fact: back before there were clocks, people used the word “sunwise” to describe the direction we now call “clockwise.”