This is a very simple idea than can be used in a variety of ways to tackle many of the bug-bears of chronological understanding.
Use your students as centuries to create a timeline and then all kinds of things become possible – sorting out periods and overlaps between periods, explaining what the Middle Ages were in the middle of etc etc.
Pictures, props, hats, tabards will all help make this activity more memorable and therefore more effective though the basic kit you need is very simple – and you can use the activity in different ways at KS2, KS3, GCSE and even A level.
See the activities:
Ian