How to Create a Black History Timeline

Making a timeline is a great way to start Black History Month. Students tend to focus on the well-known figures like Martin Luther King or events like the Montgomery bus boycott and forget other African American struggles. By plotting events in black history, students can also appreciate how things have changed and how they haven't.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

Things You’ll Need:

• Paper
• Pencil
• Construction paper
• Magic markers

1. Research events in black history. You could divide your class into groups and assign them specific time segments. The Encyclopedia Britannica can help them get started (see Resources for the link).
2. Make a list of events you want to include on your timeline. Be sure it gives your students an accurate overview of events in black history. Cover different aspects of African American life such as politics, economics, daily life, society and history.
3. Decide how you're going to divide up your timeline. You could choose to follow a specific issue like human rights or daily life. Or you may want to organize the timeline by the activities of prominent African Americans.
4. Figure out how many segments you'll have based on the way you've chosen to divide up your dates. This will help you estimate whether you have enough room on the piece of construction paper you've chosen.
5. Draw a line and mark the segments per the number you've calculated in Step Four. Be sure there's enough room to write a clear description of the event along with the date ranges in larger numbers.
6. Pencil in the different points on the timeline. You'll quickly see if what you've planned will work out or not. Direct your students not to write too far away from the marks on the timeline so that the correspondence to the correct date shows up clearly.
7. Trace over the penciled lines and writing with magic markers. Let the kids choose how they want to make each event on the black history timeline stand out. Use a dark color for the timeline and a bright one for the dates.

Tips & Warnings

• Consider making several black history timelines by century if you wish to include all of your events and run out of room.
• Avoid using light colors like yellow for the descriptions in your timeline.