novitiate vs time period

novitiate and time period both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
novitiate	Yes	No	No	No
time period	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, time period is a hypernym of novitiate; that is, time period is a word with a broader meaning than novitiate:

novitiate: the period during which you are a novice (especially in a religious order)
time period: an amount of time

Other hypernyms of novitiate include period, period of time.

novitiate (noun)	time period (noun)
someone who has entered a religious order but has not taken final vows	an amount of time
the period during which you are a novice (especially in a religious order)