What if your classroom walls could be your teaching assistant?
A few years ago, I turned my classroom walls into a long, continuous timeline of human history – starting at 3500 BCE with the invention of writing, running across the back, side, and front walls, and continuing right up to today.
Since then, I’ve added, rearranged, and customized the content to fit my courses, and it’s become one of the most useful features in my classroom.
I’ve been pondering the usefulness of this timeline again since school started a few weeks ago, and here are some of my favorite benefits to having it in my room:
1. Reference tool for historical context
When I introduce a new topic, I start by pointing out its place on the timeline and discuss what else was happening in the world at the same time. It’s such a simple, visual way for students to connect parallel events.
Some examples that have really clicked with my classes:
- Seeing classical Greece alongside the early days of the Roman Republic
- Linking the Silk Road and the spread of Islam during the Islamic Golden Age
- Realizing how close the Fall of Constantinople, the end of the Silk Road, and the start of the Age of Discovery were.
Students know from the start: What happened before this? What was happening elsewhere at the same time? What happened after this? This reinforces cause-end-effect and keeps events from feeling isolated.
It also cuts down on the “When did this happen?” type of questions – students can just look at the walls themselves.
2. Reference tool for scale and interconnectedness
A timeline that stretches around the room makes the scale of history impossible to ignore.
Just last week, while teaching the Battle of Thermopylae, we looked at one of our ancient sources: Diodorus Siculus, who wrote about 450 years after the war. I showed my students that this would be like us today writing about events from the 1500s (without the aid of modern technology). That comparison stuck.
The timeline also highlights how long some eras lasted. The Roman Republic and Empire together stretch about a thousand years, and the Silk Road is even longer. This provides a real sense of scale. Students begin to see continuity, overlap, and connections across time in ways that textbooks alone wouldn’t capture.
3. Low Effort, Big Reward payoff
While it does take effort to set it up, once it’s on the wall, it stays – and its value grows every year! I’ve come to understand how versatile it really can be, and I’ve customized mine to highlight the content I cover most. The payoff is real. The timeline has become a permanent fixture the students actually use and rely on in class.
Below, you’ll find a video of my timeline from last week.
If you’d like to build one yourself, here’s my World History Timeline resource on Teachers Pay Teachers: 180 events with images and short descriptions to choose from, plus markers for major historical eras. Everything is ready to print.
Happy Teaching!
Mr. G