SKIP TO CONTENT

Lesson Plan

Timelines and Nonfiction Text

Teach your students how to use timelines to organize information from nonfiction texts.
Need extra help for EL students? Try the Personal Timeline pre-lesson.
Grade:
View aligned standards
Need extra help for EL students? Try the Personal Timeline pre-lesson.

Learning Objectives

Students will be able to create a timeline using information from a nonfiction text.

Introduction

(5 minutes)
  • Tell students that today they are going to learn how to make timelines to organize information from nonfiction texts.
  • Explain that a timeline is like a number line, but instead of just showing numbers, it shows important events in the order in which they occurred. The events are ordered by date, so a timeline is a good visual way to compare two or more events in a period of time.

Beginning

  • Show images of number lines and timelines to help ELs have a clearer understanding of the main theme of the lesson.

Intermediate

  • Have ELs partner up to share a definition of "timeline" in English or in their home language (L1).