First grade and timelines

[mhaddon]

What are the thoughts regarding timelines and first grade? If you've done it has it helped? I am wondering if it is beat to wait or if it would help visually as ds is a visual learner.

[helena]

I wish I had done it in 1st.

There are some types of timelines which may be more fun for a younger. I would have done cards on a fishing line. I think it's visually exciting compared to the journal style we do now. I would do a simplified one, and maybe even play games where I mix the cards up and have them hang it back up in order. Here's a site that shows several styles: http://www.squidoo.com/homeschooltimelines

[KrissiK]

Nah! Kids that age don't really understand time. Now, if you wanted to say put the Pharoahs in order or something like that then maybe. But, I don't think that an actual time line would be that meaningful to a small child. My boys think 250 years ago is when the dinosaurs were.

[mhaddon]

Lol my son related my mil to being around when dinosaurs were still alive.

 

Anything with fishing would grab his attention 100%. I will have to check that out!

[Milknhoney]

We just finished first grade and we didn't do a timeline. My son has no concept of time. We talked about it when it got to the discussion of the Julian calendar in SOTW, but even so, my son doesn't know the difference between 1000 years ago and 100 years ago. Anything over 6 1/2 years ago is about the same to him! Plus, it was our first "real" year of school. I didn't want to overwhelm him (or myself) with too many activities. I thought just taking narrations and reading extra stories was good enough.

[bpskowski]

We just finished 1st grade as well. Same thing, he had no concept of time and dates. But we printed the cards from Hannah's yahoo group and put them in order on a string (I had them at correct date spacing, for my sake) so he could visualize the passage and difference in time. My husband continually asked him to go over the order of the cards, pretending he couldn't remember. So by the end of the year, he had most of the historical events memorized in order. I am continuing the same string with the medieval period now. The string is halfway around my kitchen! But now after dinner, my son teaches, with prompting from my "very historically confused" husband, history and gets him all straightened out as to what happened. I figure, once he understands dates and time, he'll have history in order, he'll just need to memorize some dates.

[Down_the_Rabbit_Hole]

I love timelines and think they are a great tool to show time. Just saying hundreds or thousands of years ago is too abstract. The timeline helps them see this. I think it is a perfect for grammar and logic ages. Dd(6) will be using one this year. Before we do an ancient world timeline, I made one of her life using sentence strips and pictures of her at 6 month intervals. This time line will be an ongoing one for the year where we add a new picture each month. As we study the ancient world I will add on to the timeline with many sentence strips before her section. On it we will add her brothers baby pics and other family members. So the timeline isn't cumbersome we have it fan folded.

[mhaddon]

Thanks. I'm leaning heavy towards making one. Because he is visual and time is so abstract. I lobe the idea of notecards and a hanging one. I think he will enjoy putting them on cards and then hanging them plus less space

[Mommee & Baba]

I think it did help both my dd's. They started a timeline with MOH 1 and although we ended up shelving MOH halfway through the year as they were just too young to get some of the lessons...they begged for the timeline to be brought out a time or two to go over what we had already learned.

 

We would start from the beginning of what we learned and each would take turns telling me what each figure on the timeline was. They loved it.

 

I wasn't going to do a timeline this year with SOTW, but alot of the figures that are used for MOH 1 are also able to be used with SOTW as well and I already have them cut and laminated and ready to stick to our tri-fold timeline. So I think I might just pull it back out and use it because my dd's loved it at 4.5 & 6 SO much. They are now 6 & 8. They didn't so much understand the TIME part of it. BUT seeing the figures on the timeline in an ORDER helped them to know what events came before or after another one. Which to me at that age is very good compared.

[cuckoomamma]

I think there's a lot of value in a timeline, even if a child isn't getting absolutely everything from it. Just knowing that some things happened around the same time, what things took place way farther away on a timeline, even retaining maybe one general date.

 

I see it the same way as I see incorporating small children into household tasks. You don't expect them to really dust the house, just begin to learn how. I didn't expect my first grader to know all the dates, just get concepts and provide another mode of exposure to the material.

[PIE!]

We did a timeline last year for 1st grade. DD loved it! We just used the timeline book from Sonlight. We took pictures off google images and usborne-quicklinks then labeled them. When we collected a full page we would print it on sticker paper, cut them all out, and stick them to her book.

 

She didn't memorize dates or anything - but she loved going through her book and giving us all a "tour of history." It helped her to see the order of things, and she knows there are A LOT of pages between her favorite ancient people and the page with her birthday on it. We'll be keeping up the book of time through all four grammar years.

[MinivanMom]

I did a timeline with my oldest when she was in first grade and it was wonderful. I wasn't sure whether she would really understand it or not (as she previously referred to all historical events as simply being "long ago"), but the timeline really helped her understanding. We used the Sonlight Book of Time with their timeline stickers, so there is a visual of what happened at that time. She has spent a lot of time just looking back over the timeline on her own and it has been impressive when she references things as happening before the Roman Empire or at the same time as The Middle Ages.

 

One thing that really helped with her sense of time was to put her own birth (and Mommy's, Grandma's, Great-Grandma's) on the timeline for reference, along with more recent American historical events. Even though we started out studying ancients, having those recent events as a point of reference helped her comprehend just how long ago these ancient civilizations existed and how long they reigned.

[ChrissySC]

I think it is a waste of time to do a formal timeline this young. I would teach a timeline - using their life for example. I did not start a timeline until 3rd grade. Order of events is important.

[robsiew]

FWIW... I'm not doing a time line with my 1st or 2nd grader. I don't think they really get a lot out of it. I am doing one with my 4th and 5th graders though.

 

(My first grader can't even tell time during the day... I don't think he will get much out of a timeline!);)

[nov05mama]

I think there's a lot of value in a timeline, even if a child isn't getting absolutely everything from it. Just knowing that some things happened around the same time, what things took place way farther away on a timeline, even retaining maybe one general date.

 

I see it the same way as I see incorporating small children into household tasks. You don't expect them to really dust the house, just begin to learn how. I didn't expect my first grader to know all the dates, just get concepts and provide another mode of exposure to the material.

 

:iagree: We aren't doing one formally yet, but I do have one ready to go and we will likely add things here and there...I don't expect him to remember any of it though...not yet ;)

[Aubrey]

I think it is a waste of time to do a formal timeline this young. I would teach a timeline - using their life for example. I did not start a timeline until 3rd grade. Order of events is important.

 

I tried a formal timeline. I tried a timeline of their lives. I ended up doing ALL the work, & it completely rolled off of them. Absolutely no meaning, & I thought people who said this were crazy! :lol:

 

We'll be starting again w/ 5th grade this year, & they are SO much more capable, lol!

[serendipitous journey]

I love the idea of cards on a fishing line -- having separable events you can place & pull off -- and think we'll give that a go with our first-grader. I've also looked at some gorgeous Montessori life timelines, but they are a bit pricey for us and don't incorporate naturally to history (human history being a smallish section of them!). My oldest DS loves numbers, and has a rough sense of time related to his sense of magnitude, so I think the lines would work so well...

[Satori]

We haven't officially done timelines and date memorization, but I started implanting the idea in her head at age four. At that time, we read math books that gave young children a great sense of how big a number is or how long ago something was. We studied prehistory in depth, and made two timelines - one showing the age of the universe (in billions) and one showing the age of life (in millions). I often referred to them. As a result, she has a pretty good idea when the universe began, the earth formed, the dinosaurs roamed, the mammoths walked, and when humans came about. She could definitely place all these events in order, with some approximate dates. She knows better than me what dinosaurs lived in what eras.

 

For Ancients, we didn't really use a timeline, as I saw they weren't suggested in WTM until 5th grade. I kinda regret not using one now. The clothespin idea sounds fun! We are definitely using one for Middle Ages. I won't make her memorize exact dates, but we will be looking at the timeline a lot. I just placed our newest timeline in a very prominent place last night.

[Cynful]

My personal opinion is that each stage has different goals from a timeline. The grammar stage is all about putting it in order. They don't have to really grasp the time aspect, just see which came first, second, etc. as you move through the 4 years. Then, in Logic, when you restart the 4 year cycle all over again, they can really see how things fit together. Oh, I didn't realize Mozart was alive during the American Revolution. They start to fill in more information inbetween what they've already learned. And, I'm assuming since I'm not there yet, that Rhetoric is more of the same except there is even more connecting the dots and seeing the dates. I also think that each level needs it in a different medium; grammar needs a wall/fishing line order (think highly visual), a wall/book combo in Logic and you could just use a book for Rhetoric.

 

So yes, do use a timeline, but think of it more as order rather than time (for 1st grade anyway).

[mhaddon]

Never would I dream of memorizing dates in first grade. Some interesting points. So i guess if it gets to the place where I'm doing all the work we will just stop. For now I'm going to get the homeschool in woods figures and give it a try :)