This week 6th grade Social Studies classes have been working on a timeline project using World Book Online. Mrs. Maass and I collaborated in utilizing this special feature of our online encyclopedia. Students researched 5 events from specific years of the 21st century (2000-2010). World Book Online allowed them to search by year. Most of the encyclopedia articles were about people, so we also encouraged students to try the Back in Time Articles listed in the Results List. The Back in Time Articles gave an overview of events in certain categories like Literature, Sports, Television, Automobile, and Education, or in certain countries or continents. Using these articles it was easy for students to pick an event and get enough information to note the Who, What , Where, and Why. Then all they had to do was type a one sentence description and use pull-down menus to specify the date. World Book Online put their events in chronological order and made the timeline. Students printed their timeline in color for the final product.Since this was the first time anyone used the timeline feature, Mrs. Maass and I learned a lot as the students worked through their project. I thank Mrs. Maass for being flexible when we ran into problems along the way that we did not anticipate. I am happy to report that the timeline feature was successful enough for Mrs. Maass to agree to use it again later this year.
World Book Online is a District 66 subscription and is linked to the district webpage.
