Need a way to involve your youth family history consultants? How about introducing family history to children from three to eleven? We combined both of these objectives with a Primary Sharing Time! In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the organization for children age three to eleven is called Primary. As part of our Sunday worship, the children have classes for their individual age groups then come together for Sharing Time. Sharing time...
In October 2014 General Conference, Elder Allan F. Packer spoke about family history in his talk, “The Book.” He said, Like partaking of the sacrament, attending meetings, reading the scriptures, and saying personal prayers, doing family history and temple work should be a regular part of our personal worship. He spoke about this on February 14, 2015 at the Family Discovery Day as well: Last year, our theme was “Igniting Interest in Family History,” and...
Do you have pioneer ancestors who joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) in the 1800’s and came west to join the saints in Zion? The LDS church began emphasizing family history about 1890, so you may think that those branches of your family tree are complete and accurate. Just looking at your fan chart on FamilySearch’s Family Tree, it might seem that there are no more family members to discover. In...
Our stake has been focused on teaching the primary children ages 8-11 how to do family history, and our youth consultants are taking charge of teaching them. So I created a lesson plan for our youth family history consultants to use as they teach at the children’s homes. The lesson invites the children to become explorers and discover their family’s past. Four tools from an “explorer’s backpack” are used to explain family history concepts. The...
Our ward is working on a temple challenge to find a family name for temple work by the end of November. I think it’s important to talk about the difference between searching for a name and surfing for a name. Searching: Finding records that reveal relatives not yet in Family Tree. Adding them to the tree, checking for duplicates, and reserving their ordinances. Surfing: Clicking around family tree until you find a relative with a green temple icon,...
Elder Holland’s beautiful talk about mothers today made me think of all the generations of mothers that have gone before me. It is staggering to think about the lifelong carrying that all of them have done throughout time to make my existence possible. It is not only the prenatal carrying but the lifelong carrying that makes mothering such a staggering feat. Speaking directly to mothers, Elder Holland said: Thank you to all mothers everywhere for giving birth,...
Elder Hugo Montoya spoke during the afternoon session of General Conference today about bearing one anothers’ burdens. One way to do that is to go the second mile. “The Savior said, ‘Whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.’ As an example, we are asked to attend the temple regularly, as our individual circumstances allow. Attending the temple requires a sacrifice of time and resources especially for those who have...
Need a fun activity to help your youth learn to research census records? “Finding Franklin” gives them the opportunity to discover the wealth of information that can be found in a census. Questions about Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States lead the youth to find specifics about his family and occupation over a span of 48 years. They can then use the skills they’ve developed to find their own family in the census records....
I read 1 Nephi 5 this week and was struck by the story of Lehi searching the brass plates and what he found in them. Hugh Nibley, in his lectures on the Book of Mormon, said that Lehi didn’t have the genealogy of his fathers because the records on the brass plates were rare and secret. The law was read publicly once a year by the scribes and pharisees, and that was all the access the...
Do you need a fun activity to help the youth in your ward get interested in family history? How about a Family Home Evening or Sunday activity for the whole family? Try MISSION POSSIBLE and see that it is possible to do family history! I created the MISSION POSSIBLE youth activity in response to Elder Anderson’s Find, Take, Teach Challenge. Purpose We wanted to give the youth in our ward an opportunity to teach their families...
