Category: Hands On

Fall Leaves Family Tree

10/23/2019

Fall Family Tree // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

It has been awhile since I posted a hands-on family tree craft, but I've got something new this fall season. Fall is a great time to go for family walks and hikes, and, this time of year, kids are all about exploring the leaves that have fallen on the ground. I thought incorporating actual fallen leaves into a family tree project would be a great idea!

First, take your child(ren) outside in an area where there are lots of trees - and the more variety of trees the better! (Perhaps a trip to the cemetery is in order...hint, hint.) Then, collect leaves! You're going to want leaves that aren't yet too dry; leaves with a little more moisture still in them will lay flat better when you get to the gluing stage.

Next, get a larger sheet of construction paper or even a posterboard. I used a piece of brown construction paper and cut out a simple tree trunk shape. Remove the stems from the leaves. Use a gluestick to glue the leaves onto the top of the tree trunk any way you want. These steps are so simple that even a preschooler can do it!

Next, I printed out little family photos and we glued them right on top of the leaves. We included immediate family plus grandparents and aunts and uncles, but you could also just do the maternal or paternal side or direct ancestors. It's really up to you and your kids!

Next, I printed out little family photos and we glued them right on top of the leaves. We included immediate family plus grandparents and aunts and uncles, but you could also just the maternal side or paternal side or direct ancestors or first cousins, etc. It's really up to you and your kids! Happy Fall!

Evie Finds Her Family Tree by Ashley B. Ransburg is a wonderful children's picture book that uses real images of colorful leaves to celebrate the uniqueness of each family member in a family 'tree.' Read my review of this book at this link.

©2019 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Examining Ephemera

4/16/2019

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Examining Ephemera // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Some of my favorite items in our family history holdings are those things that were never meant to be saved, never meant to tell a story or be passed on, never meant to be heirlooms, so to speak. However, many items of ephemera DO contribute (sometimes significantly) to our family stories, and sometimes they even create their OWN stories, as they might be the only evidence of these happenings in our ancestors' lives.

You may have heard items like this collectively described as ephemera. So, what exactly IS ephemera? Here is what the Oxford English Dictionary has to say:

"Things that exist or are used or enjoyed for only a short time"
(Derives from the Greek word ephēmeros, meaning 'lasting only a day.')

According to who you ask in the genealogical community, any of the following could be considered ephemera:

Ticket stubs from sporting events, amusement parks, theatre shows
Ticket stubs from travel
Personal or business letters and envelopes
Greeting cards
Postcards
Invitations
Receipts
Club or union membership cards and rosters
Dance cards
Report cards, graduation programs, reunion programs, schoolwork
Church bulletins and newsletters
Funeral cards
Business cards, stationary, ledger forms
Napkins and coasters
Matchbooks
Ration books

Using ephemera to introduce or enhance kids' understanding of family history is a great idea for a few reasons. By its nature, ephemera is very visual and hands-on; this is so important in order to keep their attention and interest. Even in our digital society, paper ephemera is still a part of our everyday lives, so kids will automatically understand what it is. And, my favorite reason to introduce kids to ephemera is that it is, to some degree, open-ended in its story and requires a child or teen to use analytical skills to piece together the item's meaning and significance.

When examining ephemera with child(ren), make it a game. Search for clues, maybe even using a magnifying glass to play out the part (much like we did for our Directory Detectives activity).

While doing so, ask them the following questions:

1.) What is the item? Read out loud any text. Examine both sides. What was its original purpose? (Answering this question may take some research and/or help from elder generations, depending on the item in question. For example, kids and teens today are likely unfamiliar with ration books, matchbooks, dance cards, or pin money clubs. But examining ephemera like this is SO great because it not only introduces kids to aspects of their ancestors' lives, but also to common clubs or traditions or events of that historical time period. Learning general history through our ancestors makes it so much more meaningful!)

2.) Is the item dated? If yes, how old was your ancestor at the time?

3.) Is it from a particular event, place, or time period in your ancestor's life? How could you learn more about that event, place, or time period?

4.) If a ticket stub or receipt, is there a price listed? If yes, try to figure out how much the same event or item would cost today.

5.) Why do you think your family member saved this?

6.) What types of ephemera would YOU save to help future generations know more about your life?

If your child is willing, encourage them to start collecting personal ephemera of their own, from places or events that are special and memorable to them. All you need is a three-ring binder and some acid-free, archival-quality clear sleeves. Or, if they are more technologically inclined, perhaps they will want to digitized their memorable ephemera and maybe even create their own personal digital scrapbook website online.

You will find that some kids (especially younger ones) will want to save everything - and this is an opportunity to convey to them the idea that you CAN'T save everything. We need to be selective about what we save. We need to choose ephemera from times or events or places that really mean a lot to us and that contribute to our own stories and family stories. There is an art to saving ephemera, and, if done right, it can add SO much to our family history without over-burdening future generations.

Encourage kids and teens to help YOU or other family historians sort through and digitize the ephemera left by previous generations. Did great-grandma leave behind a box full of funeral cards? Have the kids put them in chronological and/or alphabetical order. Are all those old letters folded in halves or thirds? Have the kids help smooth them out before digitizing. There are lots of ways to give kids first-hand experience in the process of archiving family history.

Also, let kids help you FIND new sources of ephemera that may have meaning to your family. Believe it or not, Ebay is a great place to look for pieces of family history ephemera - I've found old matchbooks from family businesses and postcards depicting long-gone buildings that played a role in my family's history. The Digital Public Library of America, as well as other state historical digital collections, are also great places to search for family ephemera.

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Map Reading at the Cemetery

6/12/2018

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Map Reading at the Cemetery // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Hey everyone! It's been a little while since I've posted anything here, and that's because our family was in the process of relocating from the Indianapolis area to the Cleveland, Ohio area. So, it's been a little bit stressful and a lot hectic, but we've started to settle into our new home and community, so I have a little more time for genealogy research and activities (yay!)

I grew up in this area, and Cleveland is the city in which ALL of my ancestors settled when they immigrated to America. I (and my kids) have a lot of family history here, and we are excited to live here now so we can explore it!

The day your moving truck shows up at your new place to unload is a day to have the kids OUT of the house and out of the movers' ways. So, my husband stayed at the house and I took my kids out for the day. And, of course, we went to the cemetery to find some ancestors.

Calvary Cemetery is the largest Roman Catholic cemetery in Cleveland, with over 300,000 interments. It is by far the largest cemetery in which we've ever searched for a grave. Fortunately, the Diocese of Cleveland has an easy-to-use (free!) online searching tool for locating burials within their cemeteries, and I had already found the sections, rows, and grave numbers we were searching for. So, I told my kids, the first thing we have to do is to visit the cemetery office building and ask for some maps.

Visiting a cemetery office building is a great learning experience for children. We walked in and approached the front desk, where we were greeted by a woman who asked us how she could help. We showed her the paper where I had written the section and plot information I was searching for. She was nice enough to double-check my search information and then she left to find us some maps. My kids and I had to be patient; she was the only one there at the time and she was attempting to field phone calls while also working on finding our maps. We strolled around the lobby a bit and talked about how it is important to be quiet and respectful in a building like this, because other visitors may have just experienced the loss of a loved one and might be planning funerals.

After a few minutes, the woman called us back to the desk and showed us what she had found. I made sure my kids were next to me when she started explaining everything, so that they could hear, too. First, she gave us a map of the entire cemetery, with all of the sections labeled by number. She highlighted the section we were looking for and the route we needed to take:

Next, she gave us a close-up map of the part of the section where my great-grandparents were buried. Their grave should be relatively easy to locate, she said, because they are in the first row in front of a larger section of grass (where an old driveway used to be). And, again, she highlighted the plot for us. (She was such a GEM and so very helpful to us!)

Like many of us, I think my kids were a little intimidated by this map more than the previous one. Just the shear amount of numbers shown can be overwhelming, but, honestly, I was glad the kids were with me. They had an easier time just seeing the numbers on the page because my aging eyes are getting to the point where I need reading glasses for small print.

I gave them the maps to examine as we drove to the correct section. Good cemetery maps (and these were) have distance scales and a compass rose, just like regular maps, and we used the built in compass in our car and compared it to the map, to make sure we were facing in the correct directions.

Here they are with their great-great-grandparents!

The next grave we were searching for was more difficult; it was in the middle of a large section. In this case, our helper at the cemetery office highlighted larger monuments nearby that we could use as reference points, which is SUCH a valuable skill to have when doing any sort of map reading, but especially in cemeteries. (You can actually see two of the larger reference monuments in the photo of my kids below - just over my son's shoulder.) My kids also soon found out that the columns and rows that look so neat and straight on the map aren't always that way in real life, especially when you are dealing with older gravestones that have shifted slightly over time due to land settling or tree roots actually moving the stones. It took more time to find this one, but we were again successful!

I'm so glad we had this opportunity to explore this cemetery and find some ancestors. We will surely be back to look for others, and now that I've found the cemetery maps online, we can do a lot of the prep work together at home. And next time, we will bring along our own highlighters, magnifying glasses and/or reading glasses, and waterproof shoes. :-)

I think with all of the GPS on our phones and in our cars, map reading is becoming a dying art. But it's still SO important to learn and it helps kids really develop that kind of spatial awareness and aptitude that is beneficial not only when trying to find your way around, but also when learning other disciplines, such as art, geometry, chemistry, and even higher-level calculus. So, tackle one of these larger cemeteries with your kids or grandkids, go with plenty of time to kill, and let the kids read the maps and lead the way. They will be SO proud of themselves when they discover the resting place of an ancestor!

©2018 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Directory Detectives

1/29/2018

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Directory Detectives // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

This month's Family History for Children Blog Link-Up theme is Teaching Children Genealogy SKILLS. This is a subject near and dear to my heart, because this is mostly what I have blogged about for the past four years or so. I am ALWAYS looking for new, age-appropriate ways in which to introduce kids to skills that, as a genealogist, I use everyday (sometimes without even realizing I am doing so).

My kids are a little older now (10 and 7), so I want to encourage them to start looking at more actual record sources I use in my research. However, I don't want to overwhelm them with complicated documents and difficult-to-read handwriting. So, I thought we'd do a little something with city, town, and county directories. Directories are one of the most valuable sources of data for genealogists, and they are also one of the most simple to understand, which makes them perfect for kids to explore.

Most children today have probably never even seen, let alone used, a telephone directory. So, the first step in this activity is to explain to them what a directory is, how it was used at the time it was printed, and what important information we can learn from it. The best way in which to do this, I believe, is to physically SHOW a child an actual directory. Now, I'll be the first to admit that when we receive our local directory, it usually goes straight into the recycling bin. But, if your area still prints directories, show one to your child, or make it a point to look at an older one during your next trip to the library.

Because names and words are sometimes abbreviated in directories and those abbreviations needed to be deciphered, I decided to approach this with my kids as being a 'detective.' My daughter wanted to dress the part, and honestly, the magnifying glass came in handy, because the print in these directories can be so small.

I sat down with my daughter and gave her an 'L' page and the Abbreviations page from a 1936 Cleveland directory. I explained that this page was part of a list of people who lived in the city that year, and that they are listed in alphabetical order by last name. (She is familiar with 'ABC' order, because her classmates use it to line up in school each day.) I wrote down the surname we wanted to look for (Licciardi), and helped her find it.

Then, I showed her how she needed to decode some of the information. The first name after the surname was the husband's name, followed by the wife's name in parentheses (I had to explain what those were). I showed her how to look up 'embdr' in the abbreviations page, which she learned stood for 'embroiderer.' (I explained it as 'fancy sewing.') And, of course, I told her that this was the entry for her great-great-grandparents, Louis and Adele Licciardi. (If you have photos of the ancestors you are looking up in the directory, this is a great time to bring them out, so the child can make the connection between the faces and names.)

Next, to contrast the urban directory, we looked at a rural farmer's directory from my husband's side of the family. My daughter enjoyed decoding this one more than the other, because it told her how many kids, horses, and cattle each couple had. She went down the page trying to figure out who had the most of each. I do think it's a good idea to have kids look at different directories from different types of areas, just to show them that one directory may offer certain information that another one does not. And what's included in a directory may be indicative of what was important to a particular community at the time it was published.

Searching around in directories is a great activity for helping kids practice their knowledge of alphabetical order. I volunteer with 3rd-5th graders once a week in our school's library, and they still struggle (a lot) with using alphabetical ordering. It's a skill that is learned through practice.

Once your kids master the straightforward information contained within a particular directory, go a little deeper:

- Ask them if they see multiple entries of the same surname living at the same address. Chances are those people are either immediate or extended family members.
- Talk about some of the different occupations you see. If a job is unfamiliar, look it up to learn more about it. Talk about which jobs still exist in modern society and those that do not.
- Encourage them to type a street address that they find into Google Maps. They may find an image of an ancestral home on Google Street View!

Thanks for reading, and I hope you encourage the children in your lives to explore historical directories!

©2018 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Remembrance Candle Bunting

12/22/2017

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Remembrance Candle Bunting // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

The holidays are usually joyous times to get together with our families, but sometimes they can also make us a little sad because people with whom we used to celebrate are no longer with us. I wanted to create a kid-friendly, visual way in which families can remember their loved ones who have passed away, so I give you the remembrance candle bunting.

In many faiths, cultures, and traditions, lighting a candle has been a way in which to symbolize the presence of a deceased loved one. Lighting actual candles isn't always the most practical thing, especially with children around, so my kids and I instead decided to create a paper candle bunting to hang in our home.

I found this simple candle design on OpenClipArt.org. If you click on the image below, you will be able to download a PDF containing two different sizes of this image, depending how large you'd like to make your bunting.

Next, we glued an image of a deceased loved on onto each candle and wrote their name below. Then, I cut little slats in the upper part of the candle to make holes for the yarn to pass through. (Using a knitting needle made threading the yarn through the holes SO much easier.)

Once you have all the candles on the string, find a central place in your home to display it! We strung it across our fireplace mantle. This is a great way in which to remember loved ones, especially around the holidays, or even during large family events, such as reunions.

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Honoring Ancestors on Day of the Dead

10/25/2017

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Honoring Ancestors on the Day of the Dead // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

The Day of the Dead (El Día de los Muertos) is a Mexican holiday celebrated between October 31 and November 2 each year. Drawing on both indigenous and Catholic traditions, Día de los Meurtos festivities remember, celebrate, and welcome back the spirits of dead loved ones. Family members build altars (ofrendas) to honor their ancestors and visit cemeteries to clean and decorate grave sites. Though individual traditions can vary from place to place, most Día de los Muertos festivities generally take on a happy, celebratory tone, instead of a mournful one.

Our family does not have Mexican roots, but we are Catholic and our family has been for many, many generations. All Saints Day (Nov 1) and All Souls Day (Nov 2) are a big deal in the Catholic faith. These days give us a chance to remember and honor our loved ones who are deceased, and I just love the Mexican traditions during the Day of the Dead of filling these days with music, dance, parades, food, prayer, and memories. And I think celebrating the memories of those who have passed on can be a very positive and healing experience for all people, especially children.

Last year, we spent a day in Cozumel, Mexico, and one of the villages we visited had a traditional ofrenda on display. It's important to say that these ofrendas are NOT made in order to worship ancestors; they are made to honor them and remember them.

Authentic Mexican Ofrenda

This year, as late Oct and early November approached, I decided that my kids and I would try to create our own ancestor ofrenda and share it with you.

We used several online sources (links below) to help us learn what to include in our ofrenda. However, from what I have read, it seems that there is no 'wrong' way to create an ofrenda to honor your ancestor(s), and that every family has their own style and uses their own ideas and creativity to do it.

The Day of the Dead Ofrenda from Inside Mexico
Build a Day of the Dead Ofrenda to Honor Your Departed Loved Ones from Zinnia Folk Arts
How To Make a Day of the Dead Altar from TripSavvy

So, here is a photo of our ofrenda. We covered a bench with a white bed sheet and placed a large photograph of our ancestor (my grandmother, my kids' great-grandmother) in the center. We've included bread, water, salt, and fruit, along with various symbols of our Catholic faith, such as a cross, a statue of the Virgin Mary, and a rosary. We also have scented candles, which we lit (with adult supervision only!). We included one of my grandmother's books, because she loved to read, and a deck of playing cards, because she also enjoyed card parties with her friends. You can also include a few smaller photos, if you like.

Honoring Ancestor on the Day of the Dead // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Traditional ofrendas are decorated with cempasúchitl flowers, sometimes known as Mexican marigolds. We used some orange-colored silk flowers instead of real ones, but I still think it looks nice. You can also use mums, which are easy to find during this time of the year. Mexican ofrendas also typically include colorful papel picado banners. It is easy to make simple banners using string and tissue paper, but I found a good deal on Amazon for a small pre-made banner.

Day of the Dead ofrendas are also often decorated with artistic representations of human skulls, also known as calaveras or sugar skulls, because they are often made of candy or dough and edible. We did not make sugar skulls, but we did color some paper ones to include on our ofrenda. I found a public domain image of a black-and-white calavera, so I copied it to a document (in two sizes) and made a printable for you to download.

Here are a few other links at which you can download sugar skull templates or other free Day of the Dead printables and activities for kids:

Free Printable Dia de los Muertos Coloring Page
Day of the Dead Printable Craft
Dia de los Muertos Sugar Skull Boxes
Free Day of the Dead Printable
Day of the Dead Felt Craft for Kids
Elementary-Level Day of the Dead Vocabulary Worksheet & Word Search

And, of course, don't forget that your local library likely has some great kid-friendly picture books about Day of the Dead festivities and what they mean. Some of these are bilingual, too, so they are great if you are trying to introduce your child(ren) to Spanish. I've featured a few below, and if you click on the image, you will be directed to the book's Amazon.com page. Purchasing through these links provides Growing Little Leaves with a small portion of the sale (at no extra cost to you).

Does your family regularly participate in Day of the Dead festivities? If so, I'd love to hear about your traditions and see photos! As always, thank you for reading!

©2017 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Back to School Blessings

9/20/2017

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Back To School Blessings // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

This month's Family History for Children Blog Link-Up is entitled "School and Family History." So today, I'm going to talk about how you can use your family's history to instill within your child(ren) a sense of gratitude for education.

Like most first-world kids today, growing up, I took for granted the fact that I had the opportunity to attend school until full adulthood (and beyond). But, for many of our family members even just a hundred years ago, that opportunity was not available, and simply attending school was a huge privilege.

One of my favorite pieces of information listed in the 1940 U.S. Census for each person enumerated is "Highest Grade of School Completed." When I first started learning about my great-grandmother, Sophia Krupa Bodziony, I found her and her family in this census and noticed that she only had a 2nd grade education (see below). In my subsequent research, I learned that she was born illegitimate in one of the poorest areas of what is now Poland in the late 19th century. I'm willing to bet she never attended a school at all, but learned the little that she did know from a family member.

Detail from 1940 U.S. Census showing education levels of Sophia Bodziony, her husband, Michael and four of her five children.

Sophia's decision to immigrate to America, along with changing societal attitudes about social welfare and educational access, made a huge difference for her descendants. Though the family was still poor, all of her children stayed in school longer than she did, and three of her daughters graduated from high school. Go just one more generation, and several of Sophia's grandchildren not only earned university degrees, but graduate degrees as well.

Sophia's story isn't unique in my family tree. None of my great-grandparents had an education beyond the 8th grade level, yet all of them had children that graduated from high school and grandchildren that earned college degrees. And these stories of educational betterment are not limited to this time period. In fact, this discussion is very relevant in today's society, where everyday we hear stories about first-generation high school and college graduates, especially among families who are new to America. It is important for our children to realize how fortunate they are to have the educational opportunities they do have and to not take them for granted.

I encourage you to look at the 1940 Census with your school-age children or grandchildren and talk with them about some of the factors that may have limited their ancestors' educations:

- Lack of a school nearby and/or no transportation to get to nearest school.
- Illiterate parents who couldn't teach their children
- Need for children to help with work at home/farm
- Need for children to work a job to earn money for the family
- Too poor to afford proper clothing and supplies for school
- Limitations to education based on society's perception of gender, race, class, and/or nationality

I created a simple chart to help you and your child visually examine and organize how your family's levels of education have progressed through recent generations. Learning how to read and interpret charts is a skill that can be found in many state educational standards, and looking at census schedules is a great way to practice that skill. (Click image for PDF.)

Ancestor Education Chart from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Ancestor Education Table

Now, not every family is the same, and you may find that your 1940 ancestor(s) was/were actually more educated than the average person was back then, which is a special family history milestone in and of itself. Also, remember that apprenticing a trade or attending trade school was and still is today an important educational milestone in a person's life, and should be noted and admired.

Do you have school-related ephemera in your family history holdings? The start of the school year is a great time to get them out and show them to your children. Class photos, yearbooks, report cards, diplomas, and even just photos of your ancestors' old school buildings can help kids form a connection with their ancestors. Here are just a few examples from my family:

So, the next time your children or grandchildren grumble about getting up early for school or having to complete homework and projects, dig into your family's own history to show them that being able to learn and better yourself through education is truly a blessing.

©2017 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

Census Source: "United States Census, 1940," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-L9M1-3L3T?cc=2000219&wc=QZXY-V33%3A790106001%2C798889101%2C800542301%2C800546801 : accessed 14 September 2017), Ohio > Cuyahoga > Cleveland City, Cleveland City, Ward 14 > 92-347 Cleveland City Ward 14 (Tract N-6 - part), Sisters of St. Joseph - St. Hyacinth's School > image 26 of 32; citing Sixteenth Census of the United States, 1940, NARA digital publication T627. Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790 - 2007, RG 29. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2012.

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Grandparent Butterflies

8/18/2017

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Grandparent Butterflies from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

It has been a little while since I have created a genealogy activity that gets back to the basics of teaching children about who is in their family tree and how they are related to those people. Grandparents are treasured members of a child's extended family from the day they are born, so I decided to create a simple 'Grandparent Butterfly' template that can be used for a couple of activities, which I will explain below.

The template consists of a simple butterfly body and, when you cut the two hearts down the middle, four butterfly, 'wings.' The simplest way in which to use this template is to write a person's name on the butterfly body, and then write the name of one of the person's four grandparents on each wing. You could even add photos to the butterfly wings, if you have them. Encourage your children to use their creativity when coloring the butterfly parts. Then, glue the parts together and display them somewhere in your home. This is an easy family home evening idea that can get your children talking about their grandparents and learning their grandparents' birth names, something that most younger children do not know.

And make sure you and your spouse make one as well, and explain to your children how your grandparents are their GREAT-grandparents. If you want to make the activity more of a challenge for older children, give them a name of an ancestor from farther back in your family tree, and see if they can make a butterfly with that person's grandparents. It's sure to get them looking at pedigree charts!

I also think this could be a GREAT activity/game to use at family reunions or any other large family group gatherings:

1.) Each family member is given a butterfly body, on which is written one family member's or ancestor's name.

2.) Scattered in a pile, or hidden around the house or other gathering place, are butterfly ‘wings,’ on each of which is written the name of another family member, alive or deceased, who are or were grandparents. Because one person might be grandparent to many people, make sure you have multiple copies of that person’s name written on wings. Use maiden names for the women.

3.) The goal is for each person to find the four grandparents of the person whose name is written on the butterfly’s body. Rules are up to you; you can have people work in teams or individually. I would definitely partner younger children with a teen or adult.

4.) Color the butterfly parts before gluing on the wings, and display them together for everyone to see. You could put them on a large poster board, a length of butcher paper, or string them into a colorful bunting.

The family reunion game will require more planning and maybe even some research, because some people's grandparents will not be blood-relatives to everyone at the reunion. (I think that would be fun though - I still love learning about my cousins' grandparents who aren't related to me.) You can make it as complicated or simple as you'd like.

The template is two pages long, and can be downloaded by clicking on either image below.

Grandparent Butterflies // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

I have not yet had the chance to try this at a family reunion, so if you do, send me a message and let me know how it goes!

©2017 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Indiana's French Heritage

7/9/2017

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Yesterday, I held a Growing Little Leaves program at the Indiana Historical Society about French heritage and Indiana's historical French connections.

It is believed that the first Europeans to travel the land that is now Indiana were French fur traders and explorers in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. They established profitable trade relationships with the Native Americans, and it was not uncommon for the French traders to intermarry with the local tribes. In fact, the last principal chief of the unified Miami tribe, Francis La Fontaine (or 'Topeah' in his native tongue) had a French grandfather by the name of Peter LaFontaine.

After the British took control of the region in the 1760s, they renamed many of the settlements and landscape features, but the French influence remained in a few place names. Terre Haute is French for 'high land.' LaPorte is French for 'the door,' and is said to have been named so by French explorers due to the area's natural opening out of the dense tree cover of indigenous forests. The city of Vincennes, in southwestern Indiana, was established in 1732 and is the oldest continually inhabited European settlement in Indiana. Small groups of French immigrants continued to arrive in Indiana in the 19th century, as well. According to U.S. Census data, in 1850, French immigrants were living in 66 Indiana counties, and many Indiana counties were also home to Canadian immigrants who traced their ancestry back to France.

For this program, we had several stations set up with crafts, games, and activities relating to French heritage and history in Indiana.

We had a history station, where I had this map of New France in 1750 (source), along with copies (and translations) of French fur trading contracts, the originals of which are located in the Indiana Historical Society's collections. I also had a world atlas out, so kids could find France on a map and see its proximity in the world with respect to North America.

Indiana's French Heritage // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

One of the stations included some kid-friendly French language books and coloring pages.

At another station, I had red, white, and blue Legos for creating the French flag.

I had found this cute little vintage Eiffel Tower paper cut-out template, and I had a station for making those. You can download this craft from Flickr at this link.

As I did with the recent Italian heritage program, I created a memory game with French-English food words. Click on the image below, if you'd like to download for your use. My 6 year old daughter and I played several rounds and she enjoyed it.

My daughter's favorite activity of the day was coloring and cutting a Paris paper city, which you can download for free at this link.

And, of course, I had copies of my 'My French Ancestor' worksheets for anyone with French ancestry. These can be downloaded from my Ancestor Worksheet page.

Indiana's French Ancestry // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Unfortunately, this was the final Growing Little Leaves program at the Indiana Historical Society. Thanks to all who have supported and attended the programs. I do intend to keep sharing ideas on this blog and may explore other options for children's programming.

©2017, Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Family Vocabulary Penguins

3/11/2017

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Family Relationship Word Penguins from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

When I started Growing Little Leaves in 2014, my kids were (obviously) younger than they are today. If you search through my blog posts, you will see an evolution in activities, from basic, preschool-focused ideas to the more recent activities, which involve reading and writing. Well, it's time to get back to activities that engage and educate younger children.

In previous posts, I've talked about the importance of teaching young children family relationship vocabulary words before discussing more in-depth family history concepts. So, I created family relationship vocabulary cards using a cute little penguin graphic I found recently on openclipart.org. (Why penguins? Kids are in love with penguins! And they are just so cute.)

Family Word Penguins // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Click on image to download PDF (five pages)

If you notice, some of the words, such as cousin and sibling, are repeated on both a male and female penguin. I did this intentionally, so children would realize that these words can refer to either a male or female family member. (Click on image above to download five-page PDF.)

There are several ways in which you can use these cards:

1.) Play a memory matching game: Cut each card out individually. Shuffle, flip all of them over face-down, and take turns trying to find matching cards.

2.) Play a bingo game: On each sheet, cut off the two left-side and two right-side cards. You will be left with a bingo 'card' with four spaces and four different words (see photo below). Shuffle the cards you cut off and use them to call out words one-by-one. (With emerging readers, you will probably have to either walk around and show each child the card, or write the word on a larger whiteboard or poster for everyone to see.) Make sure you have something to use as markers. When someone fills all the spaces on their card, they have a Bingo!

3.) Independent matching: On each sheet, cut off the two left-side and two right-side cards, the same as you did for the bingo game. You will be left with the larger four-space cards, each with four different words. This time, though, give the individual cards you cut off to the child, and ask him or her to independently match the correct card to the proper space on the one of four larger cards. This variation is a great 'busy-bag' type activity that you can have children do on their own.

Family Word Penguins from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Cut off cards on each side to make a four-space bingo card.

These activities can help emerging readers learn to recognize and read some of the most basic family relationship vocabulary words. Once they learn these words, you can move onto other family tree projects, such as the Visualizing Family Relationships activity that I developed last year using popsicle sticks.

For durability, I recommend laminating or printing out on a heavier cardstock. Enjoy!

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Fall Leaves Family Tree

Examining Ephemera

Map Reading at the Cemetery

Directory Detectives

Remembrance Candle Bunting

Honoring Ancestors on Day of the Dead

Back to School Blessings

Grandparent Butterflies

Indiana's French Heritage

Family Vocabulary Penguins

Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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