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Read a timeline's ends and its marks, put a year in the right place on it, and say why something with no date cannot go on it at all.
Paper packet. Every task here also exists on screen, where it is checked automatically; answers written on paper are not assessed by Nydus. When you are back at a device, enter your answers there.
In this lesson you learn to read a timeline: where its two ends are, what one mark along it is worth, and how to count to the place a year belongs. You also learn how many years apart two events were, and why something nobody wrote a date for cannot be put on the line at all.
In the last lesson you put events into an order: this one first, that one next. A timeline does the same job and adds one thing to it — how far apart two events were, and not only which came first.
A timeline is a straight line with the earlier years on the left and the later ones on the right. Its two ends are the first year and the last year it covers. A mark — the little line across it — is always worth the same number of years, and reading what one mark is worth is the first thing to do. A gap between two years is how many years apart they are.
Put two events in order and you know which came first. Put them on a timeline and you know something more: whether they were a year apart or a hundred.
Every timeline works the same way. It has two ends, and the marks between them are evenly spaced, and each mark is worth the same number of years. A line from 1800 to 1900 with ten marks has a mark every ten years. So a year is not found by looking — it is found by counting: start at the nearer end and count marks until you reach it.
One more thing, and it is the reason this lesson sits in a course about sources. Something with no date cannot go on the line at all. Not at the left-hand end, not in the middle, nowhere. We do not know when is a real answer here, exactly as this source does not say was a real answer before.
Another way: picture
Think of a ruler lying on the table. It is not a list of numbers: the distance along it means something. Two years far apart on a timeline were far apart in real life.
Another way: steps
The same length of line can hold a hundred years or a thousand, so the marks have to be read before anything is counted.
| The two ends | How many marks | One mark is worth |
|---|---|---|
| 1800 to 1900 | 10 | 10 years |
| 1900 to 2000 | 5 | 20 years |
| 1500 to 1600 | 4 | 25 years |
Take the smaller end away from the larger and share the answer out between the marks. A learner who counts marks without doing that lands in the right place on the wrong line.
The commonest mistake is thinking a bigger year is earlier, because bigger usually means more. On a timeline bigger means further right, which means later. The second is counting marks without asking what a mark is worth. And the third is putting an undated thing on the line anyway, somewhere near the middle, because it has to go somewhere. It does not.
Read the ends: the line starts at 1800 and finishes at 1900.
Always the ends first, before anything is counted.
There are ten marks between them, so one mark is 10 years.
1900 take away 1800 is 100, shared between 10 marks.
1840 is 40 years after 1800, and 40 shared into 10s is 4 marks. Count four marks from the left and stop.
Counting beats looking every time.
This line runs from 1500 to 1600 with only four marks.
Never assume a mark is ten years.
1600 take away 1500 is 100, shared between 4 marks, so one mark is 25 years.
Work out the mark before counting anything.
1550 is 50 years after 1500, which is two marks along.
The same year lands in a different place on a different line.
Read the two ends, then work out what one mark is worth.
One mark is 20 years, and 1960 is 60 years after 1900, so it is three marks along.
Everything about Ashfield is invented, dates and all. On this line, put the year the made-up Ashfield railway line closed: 1960.
1900 |——————————| 2000
Mark the position with a cross, then write the value:
Ashfield is invented and so are its dates. The line starts at 1800, and the made-up Ashfield school opened in 1840. How many years is that from the start of the line?
1840 is this many years after 1800: g
Every one of these is made up, Ashfield included. Which of them happened first?
Everything about Ashfield is invented, dates and all. On this line, put the year the made-up Ashfield mill was first written about: 1550.
1500 |——————————| 1600
Mark the position with a cross, then write the value:
This line is not a line of years. It is the days of one made-up month, from 1 to 30. Put on it the day the made-up Ashfield market is held on the 15th.
1 |——————————| 30
Mark the position with a cross, then write the value:
Lesson test: one question per skill, one attempt each, no hints. Your answers are checked when you submit.
Ashfield is invented and so are its dates. The line starts at 1900, and the made-up Ashfield railway line closed in 1960. How many years is that from the start of the line?
1960 is this many years after 1900: g
You can read the ends of a timeline, work out what one mark is worth, put a year in the right place on it, and say how many years lie between two events. You can also say why an undated event has no place on the line.
9. Your turn: put 1960 on a line from 1900 to 2000 with five marks., step 2
60 shared into 20s is 3.