Family History Eagle Scout Projects

Eagle Scout Projects are a great way to engage youth in family history while providing leadership skills and service to the community. Eagle projects can be used to share family history and to record family history. If you have a potential Eagle Scout in your family you might think about genealogy for a great project.

Digitizing cemeteries using the BillionGraves app and website is fabulous Eagle Project which Geoff Rassmussen's son recently completed. Several of my neighbors have completed Billion Graves projects for their Eagles as well.  That is a great project that helps preserve cemeteries so that people can find their ancestors online.


A few years back my oldest son Adam completed his Eagle Scout Project by showing ways to involve youth in the vendor booths at genealogy conferences. While I was UGA president, we tried shaking up the conference a little bit by challenging each of the vendors to also sponsor an activity booth and giving them a discount on the booth in exchange for the activity.  Adam offered to help with some of the booths if the vendor didn't feel like they could do it alone.  He developed some great activities. 

Family History Bingo Make and Take

The RootsMagic Photo Booth

Family Roots Publishing sponsored popcorn

Games Your Ancestor Played was a popular booth.  It was fun to see the older generation teaching something fun to the youth.  The kids loved. it.

Making cemetery rubbings

Unfortunately we were about 2 years too early.  We didn't get a great turn out for youth but we learned alot of important lessons about youth and family history.

Luckily that has all changed now.  RootsTech is seeing record numbers and youth are getting involved all over the place. A couple of weeks ago, my son Matthew spoke again at the Ogden Family History Conference and the room was standing room only--completely filled with youth.  As he's given his "Get to Know Your Geezers" talk over the years, the room has filled with more and more youth--a great thing to see. The genealogy world is attracting youth in greater numbers and the trick is to keep them interested by providing fun opportunities within our families and communities.

An Eagle Scout project is a great way to get started.  Congratulations to Evan Rassmussen.  Our newest Eagle Scout genealogist.  Way to go!

Family History and Youth Infographic Part 2: Emotional Benefits

 

For more great ideas in teaching your children and grandchildren about family history, take a look at our Zap the Grandma Gap books and workbooks.

Family History & Youth Infographic Part 1: Academic Benefits

For more help in teaching your children and grandchildren about family history, check out our Zap the Grandma Gap books and workbooks.

Fun Printables and Resources For Youth and Family History

I found some fun resources online to assist with getting children and teens interested in family history. These free downloads include a "Family History Detective" badge to use in coordination with a fun printable graphic that incorporates the twenty questions from the "Do You Know" study that came out of Emory University in 2009.  These printables can be assembled into a fun file folder project that children will enjoy putting together, learning from, and sharing at family gatherings.

Sugardoodle.net is a fabulous website for the LDS (Mormon) community and she shares lots of ideas for youth and family history including Family Home Evening ideas, descendancy research, and indexing tips.

Lastly, I received an email from Jana Greenhalgh about her new blog called The Genealogy Kids.   She's been doing lots of fun things with her kids including a big list of family history activities, tree tips, and research rules.

Kickstarter Campaign to Assist in Family History Activities

Troy Hallewell, an author, recently contacted me about his illustrated children's book in the works called, "The People Who Made Me."  He wrote a cute poem that has a sweet message relating to family history with a catchy rhythmic beat that is fun to read aloud. In order to move forward with hiring an artist, he needs to pre-sell copies and he's using Kickstarter to help fund the project.  Take a look here for more information.  

Kickstarter can be a great way to help raise funds online for creative projects in order to promote family history.  Write a book about your own family history and get family members to donate. From the Kickstarter website:
"Kickstarter is a funding platform for creative projects. Everything from films, games, and music to art, design, and technology. Kickstarter is full of ambitious, innovative, and imaginative projects that are brought to life through the direct support of people like you!"

Gofundme.com is another helpful site to assist in raising money online.  You can personalize it to fit your needs and easily share your campaign online through social media.  Engage your cousins and other family members to help pay for your family reunion or family history chart if funds are short.

I hope Troy is able to raise the money.  It looks like a great book.  Go check it out. 

The Top 8 Websites For Family Reunions

Family reunions are a great time to explore your family's heritage together. Whether your family reunion is large or small, the key to a successful event is in the planning. Once you have selected the date and location, the beauty is in the details.  How do you inform family members about the family reunion?  What about meals, sleeping arrangements, and transportation?  What activities will bring the family members together for a meaningful event?

Take a look at our favorite 8 websites to help you plan your upcoming family reunion:
family-reunion.com
Wonderful website with all sorts of ideas from the people at RootsMagic. Also check
out their family reunion planner software at rootsmagic.com.
gatheredagain.com
Laura Phelps has written a beautiful website to accompany her book. Ideas
for activities, food, locations and much more.
reunionsmag.com
Popular magazine website gives resources for exciting places to hold your
reunion. Lots of amazing ideas.
family-reunion-success.com
Extensive planning website that includes e-books and e-courses with lots of
ideas. She gets the heritage piece.
familytreequotes.com
Reunion theme ideas with lots of great quotes on family.
genealogy.about.com/od/family_reunions
By Kimberly Powell, also a great starting place for learning about your
family’s genealogy.
familyreunion.com
The world's largest family social network. Share your favorite photos, create a profile with your family reunion announcement and add a homepage with up-to-date information about your event. Members keep the dialog going by leaving comments, questions, photos, ideas and encouragement on each others' posts!
pinterest.com
Search Pinterest for great ideas for reunion planning.

As you gather ideas for your family reunion, consider the interactions between family members to be one of the most important purposes of gathering together. Have you ever been to a family gathering where the kids go off to play together, the teens all sit around and look at their screens and the adults talk in the other room? Or have you ever been to a large family reunion where people didn’t know each other well and they were too shy to get to know their distant cousins?

Our newest book, "My Ancestor Family Reunion Edition" will show you how to change all that. Included are many ideas that will have Grandma playing games with her grandchild, aunts and uncles interacting with distant cousins and Grandpa sharing stories with the whole family. A real family reunion has cross-generational activities where everyone gets a chance to interact with their relatives, old and young. Order now and let the planning begin!

5 Fun Tips for Using Technology With Family Reunions

My son Matthew and I are in sunny California this weekend at SCGS Jamboree. Not only are we seeing both new and old genealogy friends at our vendor booth and hearing some great lectures (I brought Matthew down early so we could catch some of DNA day), but we are also speaking on some fun topics including online activities and using technology for binding families.

I'll be speaking on "Family History Adhesive: Science and Simple Tech for Binding Families" and "Family Links:Easy Interactive Online Activities to Share Your Family History".  And Matthew will be giving his "Get to Know Your Geezers" lecture.  

Two of our lectures are being streamed live.  You can catch them on Sunday morning and Sunday afternoon at http://genealogyjamboree.com/2015/schedule-streaming.html 

With family reunion season in full swing, here are 5 fun tips for using technology with your upcoming family reunions. Incorporating technology and devices is an enticing way to get the younger generations involved in planning and participating in your family reunions.  What a great way to Zap the Grandma Gap--instead of rejecting technology, embrace it!

1. Create a Social Networking Team. In order to have a successful family reunion, you have to tell them about all of the fun you are going to have and then get your family there. Put together a social networking team with some of the older and younger generations of the family to get the word out about your family and your family’s history. A member of the family can set up a family Facebook page, Instagram account and YouTube channel. They can also put together a Twitter account, a blog or a Google+ page. Do a survey of which social networking tools your family members use the most and then focus your efforts accordingly. If family members are spread throughout the different social networking platforms, and you have enough time, consider starting with a blog and then letting your social media team broadcast those blog posts through other social media.
2.  Create a Custom Family Reunion Hashtag.  Designate a hashtag for your family reunion before you get started with these social media ideas. Something like #FisherGathering15 or #ColsonReunion2015 will help you follow what your family is doing and help you determine the winners of any social media contests you have. Hashtags are labels that help people follow what is going on and search for what your family members have said about the reunion.
3. Create a "Get to Know You” YouTube Channel. Challenge each family to send in a short 3-5 minute video about themselves, their pets, their favorite food, song, activities, etc. If you are comfortable with it, and careful with private information in the videos, you can keep the video
   “public”. Otherwise, “unlisted” videos could be used but you will need to share the links with
   family members in order for them to view the videos. The beauty of this activity is that you
   will get to know those distant family members who you don’t know well. You can have something to talk about with them right when you walk into the family gathering.
4. Create a Facebook Storytelling Contest. Once you have put together a Facebook page for your family reunion (private by invitation or public) invite your family members to join you in getting excited about the reunion. Post a few intriguing family stories and then invite the members of your family to do the same. Award prizes for the post with the most comments, the most likes, and the best attachment.
5. Create a Picture Captioning Contest. This challenge works on several different social media platforms. Post a family history photo (or several) and see who comes up with the funniest caption.Votes can be taken online or at the family reunion.

Using these fun ideas for technology at your family reunion will invigorate, modernize, and bring a whole new level of interest and engagement to your family reunion activities.

Find more meaningful family reunion ideas on over 100 pages in my new book, "My Ancestor Family Reunion Edition" .  We offer 8 different versions to customize to your family's heritage. This e-book is an instant download with over 100 pages of fun and ideas for your family reunion.  Click here for more info or to order now and Happy Summer!