My Passion: Chronological History

Teaching history chronologically has become one of my favorite things to do.  When I was at school I loved history because of all the wonderful people I got to meet as I travelled through time. Their acts of bravery and heroism were inspirational. The villains being conquered were always met with applause in my heart.  The only problem was I could never connect the dots because every year we did isolated historical time periods and for some things I could not even begin to comprehend the cause and effect of these actions in time as we never continued to find out what happened.

Time lines and teaching history chronologically walk hand in hand. Dates help us to anchor our learning as we mark them off on a time line. I took this a step further and actually added our family to our time line.  This enhanced our families experience of history.  I remember so clearly when we first started using time lines we had been putting people and events onto our time line for around three months.  We happened to read a biography of Eric Liddell and discovered that he was still alive when Paul's parents were born. My son looked at me with wonder in his eyes and exclaimed: "So Mommy these are R*E*A*L people!" That ah ha moment had occurred.  He connected the dots and realized that he was a part of history.

The second thing I have come to understand during my home school journey is that EVERY THING happens somewhere in history. As Diana Waring would say "It's OK to take the Scenic Route when teaching history" It does not matter what subject you pick there is a point in time that it happened. By using a timeline we are able to add in all manner of learning.

"In history, a great volume is unrolled for our instruction,
drawing the materials of future wisdom 
from the past errors and infirmities of mankind."
Edmund Burke

I think that too often we see history as an isolated topic and that was a mistake I made for a long time.  I have found that the adventure of teaching history has become a rich tapestry of His hand working to bring us to Himself.  There is so much to learn from past errors to past triumphs. For me dates and history are confusing outside of the time line frame work. Personally I am not very good at remembering them. However the relationships in history are more my personal pleasure. I am not saying that there is no point in learning dates, what I am saying is that this is something you need to decide for yourself and act on it. For me it's the people, the relationships and the cause and effect and it's this that attracts me to learning history chronologically.

Resources
When I first started on this journey there were extremely limited resources available and most of us muddled along adding bits and pieces in as we came across them.  Today however there is a plethora of chronological points of view and methodology. Here is a list of a few to whet your appetite for what is out there.

• Homeschool in the Woods has the most amazing Time Line figures and historical unit studies.
• Diana Waring has published history from a biblical perspective
  
  • History Revealed: Ancient Civilizations & the Bible
  • History Revealed: Romans, Reformers, Revolutionaries
  • History Revealed: World Empires, World Missions, World Wars
• Sonlight has compiled  years of Chronological history with living books and readers
  
  • Sonlight B {Explore the story of the world from Creation through the fall of Rome.}
  • Sonlight C {Journey from the fall of Rome through modern world history!}
  • Sonlight G {Witness the rise and fall of ancient empires.}
  • Sonlight H {Explore the ever-changing world of the past 500 years}
  • Sonlight W {Journey through the highlights of World History}
• The Story of the World: History for the Classical Child by Susan Wise Bauer.
• Truth Quest History God Initiates... People respond ... History Happens
• Tapestry of Grace by Lampstand Press
• The Mystery of History by Linda Lacour Hobar 
  Volume I – Creation to the Resurrection
  Volume II – The Early Church and the Middle Ages
  Volume III – The Renaissance, Reformation, and Growth of Nations
  Volume IV - Wars of Independence to Modern Times 

On Pinterest

• History {General}
• History {Ancient}
• History {Middle Ages}
• History {Mystery of History Vol 1}
• History {Modern}
• History {Time Lines}
• History {YouTube}

Further reading on the www

• Make your own Time Line Tutorial. 
• History Via the Scenic Route by Diana Waring over at History Alive (Part 1 of 4)
• How to Plan Your Own History Curriculum over at The Pelsers.
• How to Teach History Chronologically There's a very good reason to study Rome before Greece. by Cheryl Lowe
• Homeschool History- A Chronological Approach over at Design Your Homeschool
• Teaching with Timelines over at Home School in the Woods.

Take some time to enjoy the learning experience of history.  You might be surprised at just how much history you already do in your day to day studying!

"History is for human self-knowledge ... 

the only clue to what man can do is what man has done. 

The value of history, then, is that it teaches us 

what man has done and thus what man is." R. G. Collingwood

Blessings
Chareen

This post is part of The Schoolhouse Review Crew Blog Cruise : The Subject I Enjoy Teaching Most. Take some time and pop on over and be encouraged.