Timeline Projects for School
A timeline project is a common assignment in history, science and English classes: take a subject, lay its key dates out in order, and show how the events fit together. This article walks through building one in Preceden, from picking a topic to handing the finished timeline in.
Picking a topic
The subjects that work best have a clear beginning and end, and enough documented dates to fill a timeline without padding. A war, a term in office, the life of a scientist, the development of an invention, or the events of a novel all qualify.
Check the assignment for a date range before you commit. "The Civil Rights Movement" is a different project from "1955 to 1968", and the narrower version is usually easier to do well in the time you have.
If you are still deciding, our history timelines collection covers more than 2,000 subjects, from Ancient Egypt to Atomic Theory to the History of Forensic Science. Browsing it shows you which subjects have enough material behind them and what a finished timeline looks like.
Split the events into layers
Most projects read better when related events sit together instead of in one long row. Put each strand on its own layer: battles on one, treaties on another, and the people involved on a third. Each layer gets its own color, so the structure of the project is visible before anyone reads a single date.
Click the Add Layer button above the timeline to create each one. If you started from the Simple layout, its empty "Events" layer is removed when you add your first layer, so there is nothing to rename. The other layouts start with two or three layers called "Layer", which you can rename by clicking a name in the list below the timeline. When you add an event, pick its layer from the Layer menu.
A layer of background events is what turns a list of dates into an argument. Your subject reads differently next to what else was happening at the time, and Make a Comparative Timeline covers setting one set of events beside another in more depth.
Mark the turning points
Most subjects have a few moments that changed everything after them. For those, open More Options in the event dialog and tick Make this event a milestone. Preceden draws a milestone as a vertical line across the full height of the timeline, so you can see what was happening on every layer at that moment. A few per timeline is plenty.
Ancient and uncertain dates
History assignments often reach back past the year 1. Preceden accepts dates from 240,000 BC to 240,000 AD, so 44 BC and 3100 BC work the same way 1066 does. BCE, BP, CE and AD are all recognized, and the periods and spaces between the letters are optional. Supported Date Formats covers the rest.
You do not need a full date. A year on its own, such as 1215, or a month and year, such as July 1776, are both fine. When a date is disputed or approximate, tick Approx. next to it in the event dialog so your teacher can tell it apart from the dates you are sure of.
Keep your sources with the events
Every event has a Notes field that accepts Markdown, including links. Use it to record where each date came from while you are still researching, which saves rebuilding your bibliography from memory the night before the project is due.
You can also add an image to an event, such as a map, a photograph or a diagram. If you are citing a Preceden timeline as a source in your own work, Cite a Timeline gives the MLA, APA and Chicago formats.
Handing it in
New timelines are private until you change that, so nobody sees yours until you decide they should.
- On paper. Click Share above the timeline, then PDF, and pick your paper size and orientation. Print Your Timeline covers the options, including the setting that stretches a long timeline across several sheets.
- As a link. Share a link with your teacher or the rest of your group. Adjust Timeline Visibility explains what each visibility setting lets other people do.
- In a presentation. Export the timeline to PowerPoint if it is one slide in a larger talk.
Starting from an AI draft
If your subject is well known, Timeline Maker AI on Preceden's homepage can draft a timeline for free, without an account. It gives you a starting set of events to correct and build on rather than a finished project.
Check every date it produces against your own sources before you hand anything in. AI drafts get dates wrong and sometimes invent events outright, and a made-up date is still your mistake once it has your name on it. Hallucinated Events explains what to look for.
If you already have the dates, paste your own list into the topic box instead. When your text includes more than five dates with a four-digit year, Preceden builds the timeline from your events rather than inventing its own. Press Shift+Enter to start a new line, because Enter on its own starts generating. The box holds 3,000 characters, and a longer paste is cut off without warning.
Editing a draft requires a free Preceden account. Generated timelines usually have more than the free plan's limit of 10 events, and while a timeline is over that limit, adding your own events and renaming the generated ones require a paid plan. Timeline Maker AI FAQs covers the details.
If you are the teacher
There is nothing to set up at a school or classroom level, and there are no teacher accounts with student sub-accounts: Preceden retired those in January 2022. Students sign up for their own free accounts, which create an unlimited number of timelines with up to 10 events on each one.
If you would rather have the class work on one timeline together, our Pro plan lets you invite students as collaborators on a timeline you own, and they edit it for free whatever plan they are on. Changes to Teacher Accounts in 2022 covers both arrangements in more detail, and Plans and Pricing covers what each plan includes.