Joe Jelen on Digital Timelines

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Homepage, Timeline, detail
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Beyond Butcher Paper

History teachers have long asked students to create timelines to help conceptualize and understand historical events. Student-created timelines were often limited by the space they occupied. Often teachers would have students focus on a few events and ask them to write very small on their notebook paper to squeeze in events. Clever teachers invested in rolls of butcher paper or banner paper to have students create long timelines. But thanks to today's web designers, timelines are no longer limited in space. Using free timeline builders online allows students to see concepts over time without the constraints of paper and a straightedge.

I have always liked using timelines in my classroom to help students see change over time and help students remember chronology (an oft-heard complaint for students of history).

I have always liked using timelines in my classroom to help students see change over time and help students remember chronology.

My students have made standard social, political, and economic timelines of eras of U.S. history in preparation for exams. My students have also created the popular timeline of events leading up the Civil War. I thought myself a clever teacher using large rolls of butcher paper for these timelines to maximize the number of events included and student participation. It was not until I sat down to read the new National Curriculum Standards for Social Studies put out by the National Council for the Social Studies that I saw another way for students to create timelines. "Learners demonstrate understanding by using graphic software to create a timeline depicting a scientific idea of the evolution of a technological innovation, and predicting how that idea or technology might develop in the next 10–20 years." (NCSS 57) With this, I began my search for digital timeline-building websites.

Finding and Using Timeline Tools

A quick search revealed lots of possibilities for creating timelines online for free. I had to spend a little time playing with each one to find the site that would best work for my needs and students. There are sites that are better tailored to elementary students. There are also those that are more powerful, but less user-friendly. This site provides a nice review of the various digital timeline sites available for free. My project required students to create events with years BCE and CE, which limited the sites I could use and may be a consideration in your site choice. You may also wish to consider what types of multimedia features you would like students to be able to embed in their timelines. Some sites offer the ability to embed pictures and videos. Most timeline-building sites allow users to embed their timelines in blogs or other websites, making sharing timelines easy.

Digital timelines allow teachers greater flexibility and creativity in assigning timeline activities to students over the old paper timelines.

Adapting the product recommended by NCSS, I asked students to create a timeline showing the impact of the Scientific Revolution on a specific field of modern science. To go one step further, students were to make some predictions about future developments in that field (i.e. chemistry, geology, meteorology, etc.). My students quickly caught on to the user interface for the timeline builder and in three 45-minute class periods had researched and created a timeline specific to their field of modern science. You can see an example of one student's timeline here. With more time and practice, I believe that my students will become better at creating richer timelines. After they had created their timelines, students were able to view each others' and comment on them. Ultimately, we created a class timeline merging events from each student's timeline to see the broader impact of the Scientific Revolution.

Digital timelines allow teachers greater flexibility and creativity in assigning timeline activities to students over the old paper timelines. They also allow students to collaborate in a way that fosters chronological thinking and in-depth analysis of eras in history. I hope that you will experiment with digital timelines and share the creative ways you use them in your classroom.

Bibliography

National Council for the Social Studies. "National Curriculum Standards for Social Studies." Silver Spring, MD: NCSS, 2010: 57.

For more information

Looking for more ideas for teaching with tech? Try Joe Jelen's earlier entry on teaching with document cameras, or check out our Digital Classroom section for articles and videos demonstrating more tools and techniques for using technology in your classroom.

Conventional timeline techniques can be used with digital timelines—the Teaching Guide Teaching with Timelines makes suggestions you can easily adapt to digital tools. EdTechTeacher also overviews digital and conventional timeline tools and strategies.

Sourcing a Primary Document

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Engraving, "Eureka," 1866, Library of Congress
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This historian think aloud shows a historian reading an edited statement by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) regarding the 1925 Scopes Trial. Specifically, this 73-second video shows a historian considering the source of this document and generating questions, before launching into the document’s contents.

The accompanying audio commentary, Using the Think-Aloud, points out what the historian is doing so viewers can see why her questions and processes are called historical thinking. These two features work together to help viewers visualize thinking processes that are usually implicit and hidden.

Why Did It Happen? Making Claims about Cause and Effect

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For more information

Christie, F., & Derewiank, B. (2009). School Discourse: Learning to Write Across the Years of Schooling. New York: Continuum.

As we ask students to become more sophisticated in their historical thinking, we expect them to move from reporting historical events to explaining and interpreting them. Making claims about historical events requires a shift in writing that requires new language tools.

Many students, especially English learners, will require more support in the form of explicit instruction in writing explanations about relationships between events and conditions in history. One central relationship in history is cause and effect.

Reading Like a Historian

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The Stanford History Education Group produced these lessons and materials as part of the Reading Like a Historian (RLH) curriculum. Three introductory lessons draw upon familiar, real-life situations to help students understand historical thinking and prepare them to do inquiry using primary and secondary sources. For example, one lesson positions students to understand sourcing by having them reason through why witnesses to a lunchroom fight might tell different stories about what happened. Also included here are resources for teaching the historical thinking skills of sourcing, contextualization, and corroboration. These include handouts that remind students what questions they should ask as they analyze documents and a helpful skills chart with useful prompts and descriptions (see "Classroom posters).

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Stanford History Education Group

Close Reading of a Primary Document

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Lithograph, "Search the Scriptures," N. Currier, 1835-1856, Library of Congress
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This student think-aloud shows a student reading a speech by former Louisiana Governor Huey Long. During this 72-second video, the student reads the document out loud. She slows down when she encounters difficult passages and asks questions when she encounters problematic language or logic. This example of close reading reveals a student considering the meaning of a document as she reads it. The accompanying written commentary explains what the student is doing and why such a skill is critical for reading complex historical texts. These two features work together to make explicit reading strategies that are usually hidden.

The speech may be downloaded here.

Scholars in Action: Analyzing 19th-Century Letters

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Scholars In Action presents case studies that demonstrate how scholars interpret different kinds of historical evidence. These letters were written by labor activist, reformer, and entrepreneur Sarah Bagley in 1846 and 1848 to Angelique Martin, a prominent reformer and champion of women's rights. Bagley advocated on behalf of the young female workers employed in textile mills in Lowell, Massachusetts, and elsewhere in New England, and was also involved in campaigns for women's rights. Her career, and these letters, reflect the ways that movements for women's rights, factory workers' rights, and the abolition of slavery intertwined in the 1840s and 1850s, including debates comparing the working and living conditions of slaves to those of northern factory workers.

Website
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/mse/sia/letters.htm

Nature Transformed: The Environment in American History

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This collection of essays, commissioned from distinguished scholars, is designed to deepen content knowledge and offer fresh ideas for teaching. Essays begin with a thorough overview of the topic. “Guiding Discussion” offers suggestions on introducing the subject to students, and “Historians Debate” notes secondary sources with varied views on the topic. Notes and additional resources complete each essay. Essays include links to primary sources in the National Humanities Center’s Toolbox Library and are part of the larger TeacherServe project.

Visitors can browse 17 essays, divided into "Native Americans and the Land," "Wilderness and the American Identity," and "The Use of the Land." These focus on the changing ways in which North Americans have related to the natural world and its resources. Topics include, among others, “The Columbian Exchange,” “The Effects of Removal on American Indian Tribes,” “Cities and Suburbs,” and “Environmental Justice for All.”

Useful for teachers looking to expand their content knowledge beyond the information and viewpoints presented in textbooks, and to get a taste of historians' debate over the interpretation of history.

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Children’s Voices from the Civil War

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Photo, "Camp of 31st Pennsylvania Infantry near Washington, DC," 1862, LoC
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Why do it?

Textbooks, which feature the passive voice and condensed versions of momentous events, rarely capture the passion and drama of the past. By supplementing the textbook with documents that show how real-life children experienced historical events, the teacher can engage students' interests and can also offer multiple perspectives on historical events.

As an example of this approach, consider children's experiences during the Civil War. Although Joy Hakim's excellent textbook A History of US (volume six, War, Terrible War), touches on how the war affected children's lives, students can gain a much deeper understanding through analyzing additional primary sources. Documents such as period photos and excerpts from letters help students reconstruct what children experienced during the Civil War.

Young girls were pressed into service as nurses when their farms and villages became battlefields.

The destructive swath of "total war" drew children into its path as they witnessed violent death, looting and burning of their homes and farms, and occupation by the enemy. Boys as young as 13 enlisted as drummer boys, and while official recruitment policies required that a soldier be at least 18, many younger boys conveniently added a few years to their age or received permission from their fathers to enlist. Young girls were pressed into service as nurses when their farms and villages became battlefields.

What is it?

After reading a section of the textbook, students analyze primary sources showing how children their age experienced the events described in the textbook. In this lesson, students examine excerpts from letters written by teenagers who witnessed or participated in Civil War battles, and they analyze period photographs to consider the extent and ramifications of children's involvement.

Teachers can adapt this approach to other historical topics by supplementing with the appropriate primary sources.

Example
  1. To gain background knowledge, students read Chapter 16 of War, Terrible War, "The Soldiers.” Ask students to consider the following questions as they read.
    • How did adolescent boys experience the war?
    • How did adolescent girls experience the war?
  2. As you discuss the chapter with students, help them understand the mixture of excitement, optimism, boredom, homesickness, and terror that many young soldiers describe. Students may note that the chapter does not discuss how adolescent girls experienced the war.
  3. Assign students to teams or pairs. Distribute copies or display the photograph, "A Soldier and His Family." Explain to students that this photo was taken early in the war (1862) in the camp of the 31st Pennsylvania Infantry near Washington, DC. Ask students to speculate and discuss with their teammates the following questions.
    • As a child, what do you think it would be like to live in a Civil War army camp? What responsibilities might the young girl pictured have?
    • What does the photograph tell you about living in such a camp? What details in the photo support your impressions?
  4. Distribute the sheet "Children’s Voices from the Civil War" to student pairs or teams. Students discuss the quotes with teammates, and answer the following questions.
    • How were boys' and girls' experiences of the war similar? Different?
    • How did enslaved children view and experience the war?
    • How did the war change the lives of the children being studied?
    • What character qualities did these youths demonstrate in their response to war?
    • How does it change your perspective to read the quotes from the boys and girls?
Why is this a best practice?

Comparing the textbook with additional primary source documents expands students' knowledge, breathes life into the text, and introduces the voices of those left out of the text—in this case, girls. While women did not officially serve as soldiers, some accompanied their husband or fathers to army camps or were pressed into service as nurses when battles raged near their homes. Supplementing the text with voices of young soldiers gives students a broader picture of how boys self-reported their reasons for enlisting and their experiences.

For more information

The photo, "A Soldier and His Family," is available on the Library of Congress website.

Hakim, Joy. A History of US. Vol. 6, War, Terrible War. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003.

Student handout, Children's Voices from the Civil War.

TR Workbench

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What is it?

What is it?

TR Workbench is a web authoring application that allows users to create single pages or full sites, portfolios, and classroom and conference presentations—"any content you could imagine!"—and save them.

TR Workbench features include integrated use of text and images, tools for image manipulation, and ample facility for substance-laden content. Easy drag-and-drop tools promote coherent content and graphic quality. Projects can also be downloaded or embedded in a blog, wiki, ning, or ordinary HTML screen. There's no software to download and Workbench is compatible with Firefox, Explorer, and Safari.

Founder, Ron Gwiazda, started TR Workbench after 27 years in the Boston Public Schools as a teacher, department head, and curriculum and program developer. According to Gwiazda, his goal "has been to create the software that we wished that we had while in school, software that would allow non-technical teachers and students to collaborate, create and share all kinds of online content."

This concern is reflected in introductory, teacher-narrated videos which not only take the user through the mechanics of establishing a site, but explain the teaching methodology, lesson module progression, and relevance of selected resources.

Getting Started
...our goal is to create the software that we wished that we had while in school...

Ease of use and technical support are hallmarks of TR Workbench and geared to a variety of student and educator needs. Tutorials explain how to create a classroom group, control permissions and privacy for different kinds of use and access, and talk about how group members may work collaboratively on specific projects.

Workbench tutorials are comprehensive and step-by-step, and incorporate a learning-by-doing approach supplemented with thorough explanations. It's an excellent program for beginners and the advanced alike.

An extensive collection of tutorial materials occupy their own searchable site.

A site blog talks about updates and projects and offers tips and tricks.

The basic free use of the site limits the number of projects and web screens. A special subscription for a teacher and 20 students costs $46 per year (February 2009 quote); additional blocks of 10 students are $15 each. This subscription level offers a variety of tools for group projects. Information about opening a block of school accounts including students, teachers, administrators—any school staff—is available on request.

Examples

Third graders through graduate students currently use Workbench. Current projects include school and teacher websites, digital publications, and a diverse array of classroom and conference presentations. Examples of the variety of student individual and group work and teacher presentations are available on the TWorkbench website. They are flash presentations accessed and viewed via a browse page.

Educators may also contact TRworkbench about free accounts. Gwiazda can offer large blocks of accounts free to teachers and programs with a keen interest in experimenting with online collaborating, creating and sharing, and will offer tech support as needed.

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The Tenement Museum website provides engaging and entertaining ways to introduce young students to primary sources.

The Tenement Museum website provides engaging

The “Elementary School Lesson” found under “Primary Source Activities” uses a family photo, a postcard, a report card, and a passport to examine the life of Victoria Confino, an immigrant girl at the turn of the 20th century.

Because these sources are mostly visual, they allow easier access for young students and English language learners than text-dense sources.

    The lesson provides useful guiding questions for the teacher:
  • when helping students examine the documents.
  • After students have discussed the sources,
  • they are asked to write a paragraph about Victoria’s life.
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