Introducing The Family History Guide — LDS Family Home Evening Fun!
Planning a Family home Evening centered on family history has never been easier! With minimum preparation, you can introduce The Family History Guide to a group or family using the following information and suggestions at a moment’s notice. Look at the options, and tailor your lesson to fit the needs of those who will be attending. Enjoy!
Family Home Evening prep: Copy, print, and place in a basket the activities (printed and cut into sections) you would like to use for the “Family History Fun Basket” game found on this blog post. Select the ones that are appropriate for your family or group. Have a bean bag ready for the game.
If you would like 
to use the Internet and media, have your computer, IPad, and/or smartphone ready. Prepare by opening the following tabs: The Family History Guide, FamilySearch (login), and Elder Renlund’s April General Conference Address (2018) Family History and Temple Work: Sealing and Healing if you would like to watch a portion of it.
to use the Internet and media, have your computer, IPad, and/or smartphone ready. Prepare by opening the following tabs: The Family History Guide, FamilySearch (login), and Elder Renlund’s April General Conference Address (2018) Family History and Temple Work: Sealing and Healing if you would like to watch a portion of it.It will also be helpful to have a computer tab open to any of the apps from FamilySearch you may want to use for the lesson or as activities in the Family History Fun Basket (see below).
After the opening prayer and song (or whatever opening you choose), one idea to start off with a fun, short activity such as The Beanbag Game:
The Beanbag Game
Begin by having everyone in the circle select their name or a nickname for the evening. Go around the circle a few times until everyone knows what name the others wish to use.This is a good way to help remember names if you don’t know them. A person stands in the middle with a beanbag and throws it to a person while stating his or her name. The middle person counts to three while the person who caught the beanbag states another person’s name and throws the beanbag to him or her. If this does not happen before the middle person has counted, that person goes to the middle.
Options for Lesson Content
Talk about why each person (or a select few for large groups) was named his or her name, and include any stories about the names of your ancestors if you are having family home evening with your family. A name is a gift given selected for you–usually by your parents.
What are some other gifts parents want to give their children? (discuss)
What do you think of this list (which is only a partial list according to Elder Renlund)? Are these gifts that you would want for your loved ones (and yourself)?
Elder Renlund
April General Conference Address 2018
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Increased understanding of the Savior and His atoning sacrifice;
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Increased influence of the Holy Ghost to feel strength and direction for our own lives;
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Increased faith, so that conversion to the Savior becomes deep and abiding;
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Increased ability and motivation to learn and repent because of an understanding of who we are, where we come from, and a clearer vision of where we are going;
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Increased refining, sanctifying, and moderating influences in our hearts;
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Increased joy through an increased ability to feel the love of the Lord;
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Increased family blessings, no matter our current, past, or future family situation or how imperfect our family tree may be;
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Increased love and appreciation for ancestors and living relatives, so we no longer feel alone;
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Increased power to discern that which needs healing and thus, with the Lord’s help, serve others;
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Increased protection from temptations and the intensifying influence of the adversary; and
- Increased assistance to mend troubled, broken, or anxious hearts and make the wounded whole.
How do we receive these gifts? Elder Renlund tells us:
“…as we participate in family history and temple work today, we also lay claim to “healing” blessings promised by prophets and apostles. These blessings are also breathtakingly amazing because of their scope, specificity, and consequence in mortality…If you have prayed for any of these blessings, participate in family history and temple work. As you do so, your prayers will be answered. When ordinances are performed on behalf of the deceased, God’s children on earth are healed. No wonder President Russell M. Nelson, in his first message as President of the Church, declared, “Your worship in the temple and your service there for your ancestors will bless you with increased personal revelation and peace and will fortify your commitment to stay on the covenant path.”
When you think about family history, what do you think of? (Old people? Boring? Difficult? Times taking? Your great Aunt Betty has done it all?)
Bear witness of living prophets, promises, and the blessings in your own life of doing temple and family history work.
Introduce The Family History Guide –your tool for help with every aspect of temple and family history work.
Mission Statement (Introduction on the homepage)
“Our mission is to greatly increase the number of people actively involved in family history worldwide, and to make everyone’s family history journey easier, more efficient, and more enjoyable.”
Perhaps you would like to show “Amber’s Journey,” or another video on our YouTube Channel.
Open and give a quick overview of the Family History Guide (plan according to the needs and attention span of the group).
Play a game from the Family History Activities Section such as this adaptable, lively one:
The Family History Fun Basket Game F1-01 (see this blog post), and the notes above. *These are a few of the options for activities (copy, paste in a doc, print and cut into sections) to draw out of the basket (you can certainly create your own activities also):
- Play “Ancestor Basket” instead of “Fruit Basket” by assigning everyone in the group the name of an ancestor (use three or four names only then
repeat by giving that name to more than one person). Place chairs in a circle. Have enough places for everyone to sit except one person. The person in the middle calls out one of the ancestor’s names and everyone with that name changes places while he tries to get a chair that they left open. Whoever is left without a place to sit is now the “person in the middle.” You can add the option to tell a story or memory about the ancestor whose name you were given when you are in the middle. - Find something in the house from your family’s history and tell the group about it, or have a parent talk about it and share the related story.
- Share what your favorite family food is that your grandmother cooks (or cooked)? Ask three more people to also share. After you share, show the video “Baking Grandma’s Rolls.”
- Divide into groups and separate to plan a charade about a favorite family history story–act it out using no words and have everyone guess the answer. For story ideas, you can explore the app All The Stories (see directions above).
- Ask each member of the group to say something nice about the person sitting to the right of them (or ask a few people to say something about another member). This is now in the memory of each of these family members (or group members)–so it is part of their own history!
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*see ideas below (Internet needed) from which to choose for the Family History Fun Basket activity (some of these could be an entire family home evening lesson for another time!):
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All The Stories: open in FS app gallery (the link is on the home page at the end, “All Categories,” then click “Photos and Stories” and you will see it listed). Follow instructions, and you will see all the stories are on your tree in a searchable list to the left of the page. You can click the stories to start reading them, or click the “synchronize” button to re-sync with FamilySearch–you will see the number of persons being searched at the top). Share a story with the group (and share how you are related to that person – your relationship will be on the same page as the story when you click on it). The length of each story is listed next to its title. Note: this link may already be on a computer tab as per suggestion at the beginning of this post (FHE lesson). After you have logged in, you will find it there. When you have a moment, watch for the number of persons who are being searched on your family tree (placed there by anyone) by synchronizing at the top of the page (click if it doesn’t begin automatically). When the number count is finished, it disappears and you have to start synchronizing again–so watch it until it is finished. The stories are in a searchable list on the left of the page (and can be clicked on the fan chart). When you select one, your relationship to that person is also listed! Caution: you may want to explore this app at the end of the evening because it is addicting!
Who’s Who in Your Family History (open the blog post and follow the instructions)–this FamilySearch game offers ten photos of your ancestors and asks you to identify who it is that you are viewing in the picture. Have fun by trying to guess a few of your ancestors. It will be on your page once you sign into FamilySearch.
If you are playing “The Family history Fun Basket” with a group of people who are not related to each other, you can try the “Relatives Around Me” app for fun! This provides an easy way to find relatives within minutes! Long-lost cousins are no longer lost – if they happen to be within 100 feet of each other, and logged into the Family Tree app at the same time. O You can find more directions if you need them here: https://www.
Geneopardy – open in the FamilySearch app gallery (found at the bottom of your homepage), follow instructions, divide into teams, 
play the game! For more ideas about this game and more inspiration see this blog post.
“Compare-A-Face” is a new way to find out where you got your good looks! It uses your picture, the portraits of your ancestors on FamilySearch.org, and facial recognition software to tell you how much you look like your ancestors.Try it out by clicking this link (or put it in your browser): https://www.familysearch.org/discovery/compare. If you have time, others can try it, too!
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Wrap-up: Invite everyone to make a sacrifice to do more family history and reap the promised blessings. Make plans together.
One idea is to summarize and close the lesson (along with your testimony of the help we get from those who have gone on before us) with this video from our YouTube channel before the closing prayer.
