Each of my "students," John, Joshua, Christianna and Josiah, drew pictures and wrote captions to remember the major details of the kings of Israel. Each day, Monday through Thursday, I would read to them from the Narrated Bible which puts the Old Testament in chronological order, placing the Major and Minor Prophets with I & II Kings and the Chronicles.
While I read, my "students" listened and took notes of the important facts that they wanted to put on the timeline. On Fridays, they worked in pairs creatively putting their information in the right places. The designers of some of the drawings are: Josiah – Solomon's temple; Christianna – Solomon's chariots and horses, Queen Esther, and Daniel and the lion; Joshua – the drawings for Saul and most of the kingdom of Judah; John – the hand on the wall, the Marathon runner and most of the kingdom of Israel.
We learned a lot of facts that we had not known before about the 20 kings of Judah and the 18 kings of Israel. We cheered for the faithful kings such as Jehosaphat, Hezekiah and Josiah, and "booed" those that rejected God and set up idols or turned to other nations for help. The time line helped us to see who was king in both Israel and Judah and also who were the prophets warning them of God's wrath if they continued in sin. As both nations went into captivity, we learned about the other nations that were in power at that time: Assyria, Babylon, Persia and Greece. God not only used these nations to punish Israel, but also to encourage and help them to go back to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple and the walls of the city.
These 550 years of Israel's history took us about 5 months to explore and record in this fashion. The timeline gives us a quick and easy way to review the facts. One nice thing is that it is portable, so if you would like a close up look at some of the drawings, we could bring it with us the next time we see any of you. :)
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