Back to History Reviews
Review by Carrie Fernandez
Disclaimer: I was provided with a free product in return for my honest review. I was not financially compensated for this post. All thoughts and opinions expressed herein are my own and not influenced by the developing company and/or its affiliates in any way.
Add-A-Century Timelines are available for purchase on the publisher’s website here: www.addacentury.com
If you are like me, the thought of incorporating a timeline into your homeschool sounds like a great idea, but it also sounds overwhelming. I read about a lot of different ways to make one, but most of them involved taking up an entire wall somewhere in your home. If you have a “classroom” I can see how that might work, but if you do your work at the dining room table like we do, well, let’s just say my husband doesn’t want a timeline on our dining room wall.
We started Mystery of History this year and I really wanted to do a timeline. I researched many different timeline products, knowing what I wanted, but not finding it. That is, until I found Add-A-Century! At first I thought it was just too good to be true. A timeline that will span as many years as you want, with different categories so you can incorporate other subjects besides just history, all the while it doesn’t have to get plastered on your wall? You can bet I was going to check this out.
When I received my Add-A-Century Timeline Starter Kit in the mail I was excited. Upon opening it up I discovered that it was really easy to get the whole idea of how it works. It has nine different categories that you can customize on your timeline. You can use them all, or just a few. They are: history, war, life, church & religion, art & music, fictional characters, science & technology, and government & politics. When you are learning about a famous scientist in science, you can add it to your timeline in the “science” category and when you are learning about Ancient Egypt you can add it to the history category, even if they are in the same year!
The best part about Add-A-Century Timelines, in my opinion, is how easy it all folds up. The starter kid contains connectors that connect your sturdy timeline pages together. You can then arrange them in an oversized binder with the included binder tabs (also avail from Add-A-Century) or accordian fold them and store them neatly. When you open it up it opens as wide as you have connected it and folds back up easily. If you make a mistake on one of your sheets, no problem…just flip it over or get a new one. If you have a very “busy” century, you can use the included flip-ups to add additional information to your timeline, or you can span the dates across and allow more room for each timeframe.
The Add-A-Century Timeline Starter Kit includes:
- 40 pages with Date & Category Labels
- Connectors
- 126 Colored Stickers
- 10 Flip-ups
- Binder Tabs
- 2 Image Sheets
Priced at $49.50 plus shipping, this is a worthy investment for your homeschool, as you can use it for several years. If you need to add to your starter kit, you can purchase an add-on pack, additional flip-ups, or the handy binder at any time.
We love Add-A-Century. It is working beautifully with Mystery of History. We plan to keep using our timeline in the coming years, adding to it as we study history chronologically. I highly recommend this excellent resource. For me, it takes the inconvenience out of doing timelines and makes it enjoyable experience!
