Today saw the  launch of Christopher Lloyd’s latest book in the What on Earth series, it is called What on Earth? Wallbook. You might recall my recent Blog post on one of his previous books.

The new book is an interesting concept because you can read it like a book or display it on a wall.  It contains 13.7 billion years of history in timeline which is just over 7 feet long and features over 1000 pictures.  Chris sees the timeline as a visual way of taking in the enormous, but compelling story of planet, life and people over the last 13.7 billion years.

TWELVE streams of colour provide the backdrops along a timeline on which all the major events of natural and human history unfold. Space, Earth, Sky, Sea, Land and Humanity account for the story of evolution while Asia, the Middle East, Europe, the Americas, Africa and Australasia convey the rise and fall of human civilisations.

At the top of the timeline is a series of globes. To begin with they track the movement of the world’s continental plates which collide into a single supercontinent, and then prise apart again, a geological cycle that repeats over millions of years.

Later on, these globes reflect a similar rhythm with the rise and fall of human civilisations. Empires, like the Earth’s crust, erupt, collide and crumple, but their converging and splitting happens on a far tighter scale where centimetres measure centuries not millions of years…

On the back is a 7,000 narrative guide that tells the story in words, cross referring the most seismic moments in global history with the timeline overleaf…

You can find out more about the book and the concept behind it on the newly launched dedicated web site.

In conjunction with the book launch Chris launched an appeal for people to help him compile a dossier of strategies that could and should be employed to engage our nation’s young minds with a thirst for learning:

Please send me your best and worst memories of education.

Perhaps you are being educated now or maybe you are an educator? If so, what engages you in learning? What do you find motivating and inspiring? What in your experience makes an effective learning environment – at home or school? How should the curriculum be organised? What is the right balance between learning and testing?

I am committed to collating and presenting these ideas, along with a copy of the What on Earth? Wallbook, to Michael Gove, the Secretary of State for Education, at the Conservative Party Conference in early October. I shall also post a copy here at www.whatonearthbooks.com for you to download.Tell your friends about it – involve anyone you know who has an interest in eradicating the cancer of boredom from our schools. Who knows? Perhaps officials at the Department of Education will then turn their heads to making sense of our blue-sky thinking and convert at least some of our creative ideas into practical policy.

Please email your ideas to chris@whatonearthbooks.com