Using Movement to Teach Timelines

Here's one of my favorite quick activities that works for any unit:

Stretch a piece of tape across your classroom floor and mark your decade or century points. Label your zero point clearly so students have an anchor. Then hand out index cards with historical events written on them.

Call up a group of 6-8 students to figure out where they belong on the timeline and physically stand there — negotiating with each other the whole time.

For an extra challenge call out directions like "Shift 50 years later." or "Move 20 years earlier." Suddenly everyone has to recalculate relative to their neighbors. 

Swap groups out until everyone has had a turn — or until the concept clicks, whichever comes first.

Why does this work? Because students aren't just reading about chronology, they're discussing it, moving their bodies, and spatially experiencing the distance between events.