Are Timelines Too Hard to Do? Recently a dear friend and home school mom extraordinaire came to me with questions on how to make her History & Geography studies more interesting. I asked her if she was using a timeline, to which she exclaimed That is just too hard! You may be thinking the same thing, but nothing could be further from the truth. Timelines are a very simple, enjoyable, but effective way to make not only the study of History interesting, but a powerful way to make sense of historical fiction and biographies. How to start? There are 2 common ways to do a timeline: a wall timeline or a Book of the Centuries. The easiest for many is to do a timeline on the wall. You can use one of the excellent commercial timelines with colorful dated lines and professionally drawn figures, but just a string along your wall with dates and stickmen will suffice. Dont have enough space for a wall timeline? Our timeline was above a wide door jam. Friend had theirs in a bare wall in the bathroom or down the stairs. Others have used the sewing board method where they take a board that is folded like an accordion and stretch it out when they need it and fold it up and tuck it behind furniture when they dont. If a wall timeline is the way you want to go, get creative with your space! Book of the Centuries is a term coined by Charlotte Mason. This is a simple book or binder with chronological dates running through it where you can place your information. Your Book of the Centuries can be an impressive keepsake and added to year after year. There are several beautiful prepared books you can purchase, or you can add pages to a binder to create your own. What information needs to be added to a timeline and how and when do you add it? Timelines can include as much or as little as you prefer. I like to include a graphic, the date, the name of the person or event and a brief summary of the person or events importance to that time period. The drawing can be an elaborate, detailed drawing or a simple stickman. It can be hand done by you or your child, or professionally done by an artist. Home school Mom and professional artist Amy Pak of History Through the Ages has beautifully crafted figures that can be used as is or colored and added to your timeline. I like to use a combination of both pre-crafted figures and hand drawn. I dont always have the time to draw them all, or the artistic ability to convey what I want to express. Sometimes the pre-drawn figures do not have the characters needed, so I or my child can do a sketch. Family photos can be included as well. Timelines can be started at any time period and at any age. Start with what is familiar. As a Christian, the most important time periods are Christs birth, life, death and resurrection. So I put those dates right in the middle. An easy way to remember what BC and AD (Anno Domini) mean is: BC Before Christ and AD After Death. I put Creation at the far left and my familys birth dates at the far right. A child can relate best to a timeline when their own birthday, and that of parents and siblings are added. Add Grandma & Grandpa, Aunts & Uncles to give a sense of time that is real to a child. How do you fill out the rest of your timeline? I prefer to add in characters as we learn about them. If we are reading a historical fiction book such as the Bronze Bow, I would put it in Roman times. When we read about King David from the Bible, he gets placed in 1040 - 970 BC. The biography of Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place, takes place in and around 1940, when the Nazis invaded Holland for World War II. Madeleine Takes Command is about Madeleine de Vercères in Canada during 1670. As you read about these people and times, history starts to make sense and come alive. Another way to fill in a timeline is to start at the beginning of time and do a chronological study of time. Read Genesis and work forward through an overview of the Old Testament, then add in the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Middle Ages, Renaissance, Reformation and Modern Times. I would still begin the timeline with what is familiar to a child - their birthday, family history, Creation and Christ - then fill in the rest. How long does it take to complete a timeline? A lifetime. So take your time. As you read historical fiction, biographies, listen to CDs and learn of more that fits in your timeline, add what you believe to be important. It is a treasure to work on now, and a keepsake for the future. Who knows, some day you may be enjoying your Book of the Centuries with your grandchildren!
Posted on: Thu, 04 Dec 2014 00:59:12 +0000
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