The Family History Guide To The Rescue
One of the reasons I am so excited about The Family History Guide is that I remember the day in 2010 when I began working at a Family Search Library. Although I had been doing my own family history since the early 80s, I had no idea what was available electronically or in the stacks of books, periodicals, films, and microfiche in the library. I had no clue how I was going to be able to help other people when I wasn’t very familiar with electronic family history resources. I had been on FamilySearch and looked through some things, but the FamilySearch / Family Tree was not even in existence back then. When we were called by a church leader to serve there, my husband had never done any family history. We were shown a brief glimpse of the home screen and just started clicking on buttons. There was a binder with some helpful things in it, as I recall. There was also a list of people that were specialists in certain localities and languages, posted on a wall.
We spent about the next five years working in the library for 8 hours once a week and then I did 30 more hours at home trying to learn. I had a lot of help, and the more I learned the more I loved it. But it was a pretty tough, slow, uphill journey. It wasn’t easy and I wasn’t very efficient at first, It didn’t seem like a lot of fun sometimes either. But I kept trying and in the process, learning. It didn’t happen in a heartbeat either. Like most things when you have worked very hard, and start to come to the top of the first hill, you can see how far you have come! It was gratifying to be able to be more confident in helping others as I learned for myself. I had so many questions in the beginning! Everything has gotten so much better.
We are so fortunate these days to have The Family History Guide, where everything we learn is now easier, more efficient and more enjoyable. Yesterday I had the wonderful opportunity of teaching two classes at a genealogy and family history seminar in Santa Clara, CA. I had an opportunity to share how The Family History Guide rescued me back in 2016.
Preparing for the class seemed so overwhelming at first because so many good things kept coming to my mind. The Training section is so wonderful in The Family History Guide. It helped me narrow it down to a reasonable amount of information. Our son, a university professor, helped me focus by asking me what are three important things you want your audience to take away? I pondered that quite a lot.
First I wanted to make this work easier, more efficient and, more enjoyable for them. I did that by showing them a glimpse of what is on the site for their use from the Home page of the Family History Guide! I stressed that they could go anywhere from the Homepage and the Site Map! They were pretty wowed by the whole thing! Then I demonstrated how to use The Family History Guide. I was showing them more about Projects, Goals, and Choices, the Country Pages, the Online Tracker. We looked at how the website is organized and full of hyperlinks to take them where they want to go.
I touched on things that will hopefully be of great use to them based on a few simple questions I asked at the beginning of the class. “How many of you have been doing your family history for more than 10 years.?” More than half in the audience raised their hands. “How many of you are new to family history?” 4 people raised their hands. This was what I expected in a genealogy user group. The last question I asked them was, “How many of you are teaching someone about genealogy? About a third of those present were. That took just a few minutes to get the demographics of the two groups and helped me decided what to share from the Family History Guide.
The second thing I wanted them to take away was “You have to put your hands on it.” If you want to play the piano, you can listen and watch others play all day but until YOU put your hands on it, you will never know how to play. It is exactly the same way with The Family History Guide. Don’t be one that just knows about The Family History Guide but doesn’t try it out. One step at a time you can learn everything you will need to be successful. Take advantage of the beautifully organized learning system that is yours for free.
The third thing I wanted them to take away was the idea of becoming an independent learner. With The Family History Guide, you can become an independent learner and trainer. You don’t need to be at another person’s elbow anymore to learn every little thing. Gaining knowledge, efficiency, and independence is very liberating and enjoyable. You may still enjoy working with your favorite mentor and you will also love sharing information back and forth with other family history enthusiasts because that is one of the best things about being passionate about something. But it will be different and better. Enjoy the journey! If you love the Family History Guide and what it can do for you, please share it with others!
Thanks, Bonnie for relating your experience. This is exactly what we designed The Family History Guide to be….the Swiss Army knife for genealogy!