I was a little sad to wrap up Chapter 4 a little over a week ago. It's shocking, actually. When I first looked over the material, I told Bill I wanted to just skip the whole chapter because it sounded like a big waste of time. I like to go into detail with lessons, and the thought of trying to put all of world's history into timeline format, and then present it over a two to three week period sounded impossible. Bible, US, world, and family timeline all in one chapter? How is that even possible? I looked up Weaver reviews online and realized that this is the chapter when a lot of families abandon Weaver over the same feelings I was having. Families were frustrated at trying to breeze through US history in just a couple weeks. (US History is covered in detail in Volume Two of Weaver, if I understand correctly.) Bill looked over the material and had no idea why I was so against this chapter. He said that it should be the easiest unit yet. I was basically teaching them the concept of time, and that history is a record of events on a timeline. I was still unsure of this unit, but liked the idea of the Family memory book in the lesson plans, so I decided not to skip Chapter 4 after all. It ended up being one of my favorite units so far.
For this unit, I bought two used books online with great reviews. One of them is Adams Synchronological Chart or Map of History.
I was shocked when this one arrived on my doorstep. It's HUMONGOUS. I love it, love it, love it. The pages fold out accordion style- up to 25 feet. You can also flip through it like a book, and only fold out pages you want to look at. It is so very detailed- it's really awesome to see events of the Bible on a timeline like this. I sometimes run Old Testament stories in my mind back to back, forgetting that hundreds, and sometimes thousands, of years separate events.
I also bought a world history timeline book, The Wall Chart of World History published by Barnes and Noble. It folds out accordion style also.
The kids loved filling in dates on the Biblical timeline. We plan to keep up with it throughout their Bible lessons, adding to it as we go along in their school years.
We also started a US history timeline. We mainly studied the Mayflower voyage, George Washington's life, the writing of the Constitution, and the history of the Star Spangled Banner. The point wasn't to give a detailed US history, but to give the concept that certain events in time built our country.
My mom's hobby is genealogy, so she went over family history with them during an overnight stay, including stories passed down through the generations. Creative writing revolved around their own memories of childhood, and why their family is special to them. Final copies will be put into a binder (I haven't actually got around to do that yet.) We had fun looking through their baby scrapbooks, teaching them that they have their own history. Bible lessons pointed to God's plan for mankind that He is carrying to completion.
I have to confess- usually when I read verses in the Bible with genealogy, I tend to gloss over long names I can't pronounce and quickly move on. This chapter forced me to look at those names and realize that family is important to God-He felt it necessary to have those names included in His Word. I am really glad Bill talked me out of skipping this unit!
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