As a former high school English teacher and now a homeschooling mom, I love all things school.

Seriously.

Nothing makes me happier than a basket of fresh office supplies, the cracking open of a blank notebook, the smell of a newly-opened box of crayons, the opening of a package of untainted curriculum.

That’s right, I was the kid, the teacher and now the mom who loooooves the back-to-school time of year, so you can imagine my excitement when I received the assignment to review timeline materials published by a company called Home School in the Woods.

First, I was impressed with the selection of themes offered regarding timeline topics:

Creation to Christ Resurrection to Revolution Napoleon to Now America’s History

For this review, I chose to work through the Creation to Christ timeline with my 12-year-old daughter, and I used the “Timeline Trio” which means I received CDs with all of the timeline figures (which included all four of the themes listed above) ready to print from my computer; the “Suggested Placement Guide” that provides instruction on possible timeline figure placement; and the “Record of Time” timeline binder-type notebook that neatly houses all of the timeline figures.

In order to make this an authentic review, I enlisted the help of my daughter, a typical middle-school student, meaning that — in all honestly — she was less than enthusiastic about doing something even remotely close to schoolwork in the summer. :)

That said, however, we actually had a good time together; she even admitted to enjoying it! (*gasp*)

Best of all, the first few timeline figures we placed sparked excellent dinnertime discussion. For example, our whole family talked at length about the differences between “young-earth” and “old-earth” creationism as well as the merits of Darwin’s theory of evolution -- and why they call it a theory.

Ultimately, isn’t that what we want? For our children to be actively engaged and thoughtful about what they’re learning? For them to question for understanding? For them to understand the ramifications of history’s happenings on their faith lives today?

I’m genuinely excited to complete this timeline with my daughter, and I’d venture to say that she is excited to finish it, too. (However, she’d rather work on it during the school year as opposed to during summer break - haha!)

Which leads me to a side note: these timelines are chock full of information! They are designed as ongoing projects to be pieced together a little at a time over many weeks or even months.