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Learn About Timelines

key pointTimelines are number lines that show when things happen.

Here's a timeline of Vicky's day:

timeline of a student's day

This timeline will help Vicky...

quickly see which event comes first or last,
see which events come before or after another event,
see which events happen between two events.

Timelines can show events that happen in different years, months, days, and even hours!

Words or pictures can be used to show events on a timeline.

How To Create A Timeline

Creating a timeline is like creating a number line.

In a number line, the smallest value appears on the left. The value increases as you go right.

In a timeline, the first event appears on the left (or top), and later events go right (or down).

Let's try an example.

The table below shows the things that Nelly did yesterday. Can you help her create a timeline of these events?
Nelly's Timeline

👉 First, let's find the first event and the last event on Nelly's list.

The first event on Nelly's list is "woke up". It has the earliest time.

The last event on Nelly's list is "went to bed". It has the latest time.

These two event will be the endpoints of our timeline.

Nelly's Timeline

👉 Next, draw a horizontal line that will be your timeline.

the start of your timeline

The left endpoint marks the start of the timeline and the right endpoint marks the end of the timeline.

The first event was at 7:00 A.M. 

👍 Mark the left endpoint with 7:00 A.M.

The last event was at 8:00 P.M. 

👍 Mark the right endpoint with 8:00 P.M.

You should start the timeline with a number line

👉 Next, divide the line into equal segments, or parts. Each segment will represent the passing of 1 hour.

There are 13 hours between 7:00 A.M. and 8:00 P.M., so divide the time into 13 equal segments.

Mark each segment with the same time intervals. In our example, it's one hour intervals.

divide the timeline into different hours

👉 Last step is to put the events on the timeline.

🌟 Nelly had breakfast at 8:00 a.m. so place this event at the 8:00 a.m. mark.

🌟 Nelly had lunch at 12:00 p.m. so place this event at the 12:00 p.m. mark.

Do the same with the other events.

When you're done, your timeline should look like this.

timeline of what Nelly did in a day

How To Read A Timeline

Let's take another look at Nelly's timeline.

timeline of what Nelly did in a day

Read the timeline from left to right.

The events on the left happened earlier than the events on the right.

What did Nelly do first yesterday?

That's right! 👍

Nelly "woke up" because this is the event on the leftmost part of the timeline.

What did she do next?

Correct! 👍

Nelly "had breakfast" because this is the event on the right of "woke up."

Let's answer a few more questions about Nelly's timeline:

Nelly's timeline

What did Nelly do between "lunch" and "homework"?

That's right! 👍

Nelly "did the laundry"!

What time did Nelly go to the supermarket?


Nelly "went to the supermarket" at 10:00 A.M.

Tip: Reading a vertical timeline is the same. The event on top happened earlier than the events on the bottom.

Watch and Learn

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