Category: Vocabulary

Genealogy Word Puzzles

1/31/2019

Anyone else ready for spring yet? My kids were off of school for the last two days, and with below-zero temperatures, we have a bad case of cabin fever. I created a couple of word puzzles to pass some time and I thought I'd share them with you, too. The first is simply a genealogy word search. This is a great puzzle for parents/grandparents and kids to do concurrently, so kids have a person to ask when they might not know what some of these different words mean, or how they are related to family history. (Click on images to download PDFs.)

The other one is a crossword puzzle that I created using the website ArmoredPenguin.com. They have a nice, free crossword puzzle generator. While the answers to the crossword clues are all likely to be words that elementary-aged kids know and have heard within the context of their own families, the clues will likely really make them think, and will hopefully help them to understand these relationships in a larger context.

Genealogy Word Search FREE Printable // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Family Vocabulary Crossword Puzzle // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Here is the key to the crossword puzzle:

family_vocab_crossword_key.pdf
File Size:	8 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

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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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Occupations of the Past Cards

9/4/2016

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Occupations of the Past FREE Printable Cards from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Have you ever seen an ancestor's occupation in a census schedule or newspaper article and ended up perplexed? I have, and it meant doing some research to figure out just exactly what that person did for a living. There are many occupations that simply do not exist anymore, or, if they do, they are vastly different from how our ancestor's worked at those jobs a hundred or two hundred years ago.

I created a series of forty Occupations of the Past cards that are FREE for anyone to download. There are a number of ways in which you can use these cards with children to teach them a little bit about some of the occupations of the past. Here are some suggestions, but I'm sure you could think of more:

1.) Print out two sets of the cards and create a memory matching game. (This would require printing the cards out on a heavier cardstock or gluing the cards to a heavier paper backing so that the designs and words do not show through to the other side.)
2.) Hang the cards on a bulletin board or posterboard for display.
3.) Create a roleplay game in which a child chooses a card and must act out that occupation.
4.) For older children: Have the child pick a card, and then use Google to discover more about that occupation.

You could also create more of these cards that are more specific to the occupations represented in your own family tree. All of the images I used are from the public domain, from resources such as OpenClipArt.org and Wikimedia Commons, but if you have a photo of ancestor on the job, that would be a great addition to this collection.

The BEST resource I have found for defining old occupations is The Dictionary of Old Occupations, which can be purchased as a traditional book or ebook, or you may it view online at Family Researcher.co.uk. (NOT affiliate links.)

The following websites also maintain good information about Colonial American trades and occupations, so if you are interested in that time period, I highly recommend that you check them out.

Colonial Williamsburg
Mount Vernon
Land of the Brave

The card file is in PDF format, and is TEN pages long. You can download the file by clicking on the image below:

FREE Occupations of the Past Cards from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

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Visualizing Family Relationships

3/3/2016

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Visualizing Family Relationships with Wooden Craft Sticks from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Most of the family activities I design for my own children involve talking about specific family members and relationships in our own little family tree. However, the nomenclature of family relationships can be confusing, and I wanted to come up with a activity that could teach my kids simply how each relationship is connected to another. Since children are very hands-on and visual by nature, I knew I would have to find something tactile to work with for this activity.

For this activity, you need wooden craft sticks, colored markers, and self-adhesive Velcro dots. I recently found some jumbo-sized craft sticks at Wal-Mart, which are perfect for writing on. (I also used slightly smaller craft sticks for certain relationships, just because the jumbo ones were taking up too much space.)

The concept of the activity is very simple: the craft sticks serve as both the individual family members themselves and the reproductive connections between the relationships. I used a unique color for each generation. The central person of the tree is simply labeled 'Me.' The sticks are connected to each other using self-adhesive Velcro dots that can be purchased at any craft or big box store.

Visualizing Family Relationships from GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Don't feel like you have to make this specific to YOUR family; the one I created is not representative of our family, and I wanted it that way. One of the main reasons I wanted a more generic learning tool is so that my kids could visualize how these family relationships fit into a family from a more general perspective. I want my kids to understand not only how each individual relationship fits into the family tree 'puzzle,' but also how different family trees can be.

Relationships such as half-siblings and step-siblings can be difficult for some children to understand, but hopefully visualizing how each person is connected helps with that understanding.

And did you ever think how confusing it might be to a young person that an aunt or uncle could be blood-related vs. related by marriage? It's something we all eventually learn by the time we are adults, but it can be difficult to understand for kids.

Most people refer to your grandmother's brother as a great-uncle, even though grand-uncle is correct as well. This can be super confusing to kids, who would logically think that a 'great-uncle' should be a great-grandparent's sibling. But in this activity, the child can clearly SEE their grandmother and great-uncle in the same generation with the same parents.

Adoptive relationships are just as important as blood relationships, so I chose to indicate those types of bonds by drawing red hearts on those people who have been welcomed into the family tree through adoption.

Visualizing Family Relationships - Adoptive Relationships // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

I encourage you to try this out with the young people in your life. Have fun with it and make it a game. Create it together and then take it apart and try to get all the relationships in their proper places. It would also make a great small group activity for kids to work on together.

©2016 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Drawing Ancestor Jobs

9/6/2015

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On September 7, the United States and Canada celebrate Labo(u)r Day. It's a great time to use this day off of work and school to talk with kids about their ancestors' occupations. Of course, there are many jobs of the past that do not even exist these days (or some that are not much in the public eye), so talking about some of these jobs with kids can be educational in and of itself.

I created a very simple worksheet to make the conversation more hands-on for children. There is a place to write the ancestor's name and occupation, and then a larger area in which the child can draw a picture of that ancestor doing their job. (Click on the image below to download the PDF.)

Ancestor Jobs FREE Worksheet by GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Ancestor Jobs Worksheet

My second grader loves to draw, so he was eager to do this. First, I showed him a snippet from the 1860 U.S. Census. I told him who this was in terms he could understand - 'Great-Grandma's Great-Grandpa' - and showed him the column that listed each person's occupation.

1860 U.S. Census for John M. Drees

I asked him if he knew what a Blacksmith did. He said, "A guy who makes swords and armor." (Apparently, there are medieval-type blacksmiths in the Minecraft video game, which is where he got this knowledge.) I told him that at the time and place during which this particular ancestor lived, blacksmiths made things like horseshoes, farming tools, and building supplies like nails or bolts.

We sat down and used our iPad to search for images of the tools Blacksmiths used in their work. For example, he did not know what an anvil was or what it looked like, so that's one of the things we looked up.

Ancestor Jobs with FREE Worksheet by GrowingLittleLeaves.com

We Googled images of Blacksmith tools.

Here is his completed worksheet. He still drew the blacksmith making a sword. :-)

Ancestor Jobs Worksheet

This is another one of those activities you could complete for many ancestors, and then compile the worksheets into a folder or binder to have a nice ancestor record set to look at again and again. And I think the kids would have fun going back through their drawings and would hopefully feel some pride in their work.

May you and your family have a wonderful, relaxing Labo(u)r Day!

©2015 Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Maternal and Paternal Line Snowmen

1/16/2015

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We are in the doldrums of winter, which means it is the perfect time for a snowman craft! And, like so many other crafts, believe it or not, it IS possbile to create a snowman with a genealogy focus.

My kids made two snowmen; one to represent their matrilineal ancestors and one to represent their patrilineal ancestors. Hey, we used those words, too! I simply explained that the word matrilineal indicated their string of mothers in the family tree and patrilineal their line of fathers. Once the kids could visualize it on the snowman, I think they better understood what I meant.

We started out with some white poster board, but plain white computer paper would work just as well. If, like me, your free-hand circles are awful, you will need some objects to trace. I used three different sizes of Pyrex bowl lids.

Maternal and Paternal Line Snowmen // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

We glued the circles together to make a snowman. Then, I printed out family head shot photos from our computer - my kids' mother (me), maternal grandmother, and their maternal grandmother's mother - to represent their matrilineal line. Likewise, I printed out photos of their father, paternal grandfather, and paternal grandfather's father to represent their patrilineal line. We cut out the photos and glued them onto the snowmen.

I wrote the names of each person under their photo and labeled how they were related to my son and daughter. The kids colored a little bow for the matrilineal snowman and a top hat for the patrilineal snowman.

We only did three generations, but you could easily go another generation or two back by making the snowman a little taller.

Maternal and Paternal Line Snowman // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

If you don't feel like tracing and cutting, I've got printables for you! Click on each picture below and you'll be directed to a PDF which you can download and print for your personal use.

Maternal Line Snowman FREE Worksheet // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Click for PDF of Maternal Line Snowman

Paternal Line Snowman Worksheet // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Click for PDF of Paternal Line Snowman

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Family Flash Cards

1/9/2015

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Back to basics. Before you can start introducing the children in your life to family history, first they need to acquire a basic understanding of family relationships AND be able identify present family members. You can start teaching children who their family members are at a very young age, and, with enough repetition, that fundamental knowledge of people and relationships will stay with them as they grow.

My four-year-old daughter and I made family member flash cards this past week. Here are the supplies you will need:

Thicker card stock or sample paint cards from the hardware store
Glue
Scissors or a paper cutter
Hole punch
Book rings
Digital headshot photos of family members
Names of family members, either printed from a computer or written by hand
Laminating machine or clear peel-and-stick film (optional)

Last Spring, we made Family Easter Eggs, and that activity required that I compile and crop family member headshot photos. I had saved that file, so I just printed out a new set, along with a list of family names that I just created in Word.

We used sample paint cards that I had accumulated over time, but you can use colorful card stock paper, too. (If you do plan on laminating or covering the cards in a clear plastic film, construction paper will work just fine, but it may not hold up well if not laminated, whereas a thicker card stock does.)

Family Flash Cards // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

I let my daughter pick out a color for each person's card. We did not really 'color code' by family unit or by relationship, but that is something that you can do, if desired. Then, we glued on names and photos. I kept the names simple, and used mostly first names only, with the exception of grandparents, because my kids use surnames to distinguish between their two sets of grandparents. If your kids call their grandparents words like Nana or Papaw, feel free to use those words for labeling the photos. I also included important family relationship words like aunt, uncle, and cousin. My daughter is starting to recognize some words, so I figure it can't hurt to have her look at these family relationship words over and over again.

After a little trimming, I sent the cards through my home laminating machine and then used a hole punch to make a hole in the upper-left corner of each card. I put the cards through a book ring, which you can find at most office supple stores. Some office supply stores provide laminating services, or you can buy a roll of the clear peel-and-stick plastic film and cover the cards that way, too. Obviously, this step is optional but it will keep the cards more durable, and it will make them washable, too!

Family Flash Cards on a Book Ring

We arranged the cards on three book rings: one for mom's side of the family, one for dad's side, and then one with just our little nuclear family. A fun activity for slightly older children would be to re-arrange the rings into various family units; for example, Mom is a part of our family, but she's also part of Grandma and Grandpa K's family along with her brothers and sister (aunt and uncles).

For toddlers and preschoolers, I recommend making cards for the people in their families who they have met and see fairly regularly. For elementary-aged children, you can go a step further and make cards for ancestors who they haven't met. I made a few cards with some of my children's great-grandparents who passed away before they were born. I simply explained to my daughter that these were Grandma and Grandpa K's parents. Obviously, the older the child, the more information you can include on each card. For example, on the back of each card, you could list each person's full name, birth/death dates, occupation, and other simple facts like that.

My daughter had fun flipping through each set of cards and identifying people and colors. It's a great little 'toy' to keep in your purse, in the car, or to keep them occupied at church or at the doctor's office.

As always, let me know if you have any questions! Don't forget that this and all of my other family and genealogy activities can be found at the new website, http://www.growinglittleleaves.com

©2015, Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Easter Egg Family Faces

4/22/2014

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Easter Egg Family Faces // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

Easter Sunday has come and gone, and, if you are like my family, you may have a healthy collection of plastic colored eggs left over from various hunts in which your kids may have participated. That was certainly the case in our house this past weekend, so I decided to set a bunch of the eggs aside to use for another family tree activity that can be used with a range of different age children.

If you are interested in trying it with the kids in your life, here are the supplies I used:

- Plastic colored eggs
- Scissors
- Glue stick
- Black permanent marker
- Construction paper or cardstock in the same colors as the eggs
- Family photos

The first thing I did was to decide which and how many family members I wanted the kids to identify. I decided to use both my and my husband's immediate family members (and their spouses/children), as well as my husband's grandparents, who my kids know and visit occasionally. I ended up needing 28 eggs. Who to include in your family is completely up to you; and remember, you can always make MORE and only bring out a few at a time so that the child isn't overwhelmed by too many at once.

I then wrote the name of each family member on an egg using the black permanent marker. I used the terms by which the kids would know each person. For example, for my brother, I wrote "Uncle Jeff." For their cousins, I wrote "Cousin Nolan." I also made eggs for each of my kids and put their names on them, along with the words "son" and "daughter" and "brother" and "sister."

Next, I needed to find photos of all of these people. All of my recent photos are in digital form, so I went to the computer. You want to use clear photos in which the person is looking pretty much straight-on at the camera. When I found a good photo to use, I cropped it so that it was basically only a 'headshot' of the person. I printed out the edited version on plain white paper - photo paper isn't necessary - and I glued it on cardstock that was about the same color as the egg. (Make sure your photos are small enough to fit inside your eggs. It's ok if you have to roll them up a little, but make sure their height is not taller than the egg.)

So, how did I use this 'game' with each of my children? For my six year old son, we laid out all of the photos and eggs on the floor. He chose an egg and had to READ what it said (I helped him with the words and names he did not recognize.) Then, he had to find the correct photo of that person. The colors acted as clues and helped him narrow down his choices. Then, he had to roll up the photo, put it in the egg, and close it. This step was actually a great little fine motor skills exercise. Since he had to read the words 'aunt,' 'uncle,' and 'cousin' several times, which are words I don't think he has encountered much in school, I am hoping that he would now be able to recognize them if he saw them again in print.

6yo son reading each egg

Putting the photo into the egg

I did things differently with my three year old daughter. I put all of the photos into their respective egg. Then, I had her chose eggs one-by-one. I asked her "What color is this egg?" Then, after she told me, she opened the egg (fine motor skills!). I then asked her, "Do you know who that is?" If she got it right, we did high-fives and moved on, but if not, I let her guess a few times before I told her the person's name. For aunts and uncles, I also used terms like, "Daddy's sister," and for great-grandparents, I said "Grandpa S.'s mom."

You can't expect preschoolers to know the names of everyone in their extended family, even if you do see a lot of them (and we live fairly far from most of our family members, so we don't see them that often.) And if you do this 'game' enough, it WILL help them learn names and faces faster than they would otherwise. Gradually, with the younger children, you can even start to read and show them the names and words on each egg - if you repeat it enough, they may start to recognize those words!

With older kids, you could for further back in past generations, and include photos of ancestors who passed away before they were born, plus you could get into more complex family relationships, such as grand-aunts and uncles and second cousins.

This activity was inspired by two separate blog posts I found on the web. The first is very basic and is great for toddlers. The second involved a somewhat 'competitive' egg hunt with no candy/prizes in the eggs, which I didn't see ending well with my own kids. So, I combined elements of each for the activities I created above for my kids.

Family Tree Color Sorter by Nicole Kavanaugh at The Kavanaugh Report

Easter Egg Family Tree Game by Michelina at Preserving Heritage

©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder.

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What Is An Heirloom?

4/7/2014

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What Is An Heirloom? // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

he last couple of family history activities we've done have been a little more advanced and geared towards my son's age (6+), so I decided to do a little something simpler with my 3 year old daughter today now that my Kindergartner is back in school.

We read the book, Ella the Elegant Elephant by Carmela and Steven D'amico. Ella is a young elephant who has just moved into town with her mother, who is a baker. Ella is worried about starting school when she finds that her grandmother (who we never meet in the story) has given her lucky hat to her. The book goes onto teach a valuable lesson about bullying and about how to love and help even our enemies. The hat ends up being a magical hat, and the story ends quite happily.

After we finished the book, I went back to the part at which Ella first gets the hat, and I asked my daughter, "Who gave Ella the hat?" She correctly said, "Grandma." I told her that when grandparents give us something that used to belong to them, it is called an 'heirloom.' I asked her if she could say that word, and she did (it came out sounding more like 'air-whoom, which was pretty cute.).

Then, I showed her a cookie tin that used to belong to my grandmother. I told her that my grandma used to bake cookies, and then keep the cookies inside of it. I let her have it and we went to get her play cookies. She put some of her cookies in the tin, along with some of her other play food. I repeated the word 'heirloom' a couple of more times, and then told her that anything could be an heirloom - a book, a quilt or blanket, jewelry, even an old toy. I didn't do so at the time, but you could even ask the child what he/she would like to pass on to someone someday as an heirloom.

I've mentioned it before, but it's difficult to know exactly how much information a 3 year mind can soak in. But using real, concrete family 'treasures' is a great way to get even the youngest children to think about the people who came before them. Repetition is key at this age. I'll continue to let her play with this every so often so we can talk about it, and I have a music box/snowglobe from my other grandmother that I will probably introduce to her soon. Maybe next time I will even bring out some photos of my grandmothers so she can associate a face with the heirloom. (Baby steps, though; overwhelming them with too much information at once will just lead to confusion and disinterest.)

©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder.

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The Play Doh Pedigree Chart

2/25/2014

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This past weekend, my kids and I got out our stash of Play Doh, because I had an idea for a genealogy-related kids acitivity. Full disclosure: Play Doh rarely comes out at my house; I am not a neat freak by any means, but there is just something about having to clean up Play Doh that frustrates me. So, needless to say, they were excited about it.

We created a simple pedigree chart out of Play Doh balls and toothpicks. A pedigree chart is basically a diagram that depicts ancestors and their descendants. Most pedigree charts are simply a bunch of names and dates connected by lines to indicate blood relations. In other words, they aren't very exciting for kids to look at, and it's hard for them to understand, especially if they cannot yet read.

First, I had to decide for which branch of the family we would make a chart. My kids are fortunate to know one set of great-grandparents, so we decided to try to make a pedigree chart for that side of the family, which is my father-in-law's side.

I got out four different colors of Play Doh, because I wanted each generation to be a different color. We started out with great-grandma and great-grandpa at the top. I asked the kids, "Who do you know that is great-grandma and great-grandpa's son?" My 6yo figured it out, and said 'Grandpa S,' but then I asked him if he knew how many siblings grandpa had. He didn't, so I told him that Grandpa S. has five sisters. Then, I asked him how many kids that would be all together (5+1), and, we had a quick little math lesson. As we were making the little balls of Play Doh to represent people, the kids also had fun putting little 'faces' on them, and got a little silly with that, too.

Play Doh Pedigree Chart // GrowingLittleLeaves.com

When we were done with Grandpa and his siblings, I asked the kids to pick one of the pink siblings to be Grandpa. I asked them how many kids Grandpa and Grandma S. have. (We did not add spouses past the great-grandparents; it would have been a little too confusing and I wanted to keep it simple.) The kids did not get this one immediately, either, but I asked them who were 'Daddy's brothers and sisters.' Again, my 6yo figured it out pretty quickly, and my 3.5yo repeated everything he said, so I think she picked up on it, too.

They wanted to add ALL of their cousins, which I thought was very cute, so we went through each family, named all of their cousins, and made little 'heads' for them. They had fun deciding which one was them and then making their own 'face.' Here is our finished 'pedigree:'

Play Doh Pedigree Chart

I tried to explain to them what a generation was, by basically telling them that it is a group of people born around the same time who are about the same age. (In genealogy research, people of the same generation are sometimes very different ages, but we need to keep it simple for kids. From a social perspective, a generation IS just how I explained it.) By color-coding each generation on the chart, I think it helped them understand that word better, at least in the context of their own family.

Hopefully, this activity also helped to visually reinforce how family members are related to each other - that Grandpa's mom and dad are great-grandma and great-grandpa or that Grandpa is daddy's dad, but ALSO Uncle Scott, Uncle Brian and Aunt Kara's dad, too. You can also talk about what a cousin is and/or what a grand-aunt/uncle is. My kids' attention spans had waned before I could bring up those discussions, but older children may be more curious and may want to know more.

©2014, Emily Kowalski Schroeder. All rights reserved.