Lessons

Lesson 1: The Big Five

Genealogy standards and guidelines: what you need to know first

There is nothing more disheartening after months of work than discovering that your results are in question. This is all too often in beginning genealogy research. Why? Only because you did not know the Big 5 Basic Guidelines of the Genealogical Proof Standards. Read more >>

Lesson 2: First Steps

Recording your family tree: first steps and family group sheets

Here is where the real work starts as you learn to climb one of the most important rungs in building your family tree. This lesson guides you through your first encounter with the extensive and often confusing but vitally important subject of genealogical forms necessary to document your ancestor’s vital information. Spend more time in genuine research through the help of our step by step instruction and less time tangled up with sorting out the paperwork required for documentation. Read more >>

Lesson 3: Getting Organized

Developing an organization system

In this lesson you will be introduced to the various and numerous data types that you will encounter as you progress with your research.

The organizational methods taught in this pivotal lesson will decrease your chances of overlapping your inquiries; which is very easy to do after even just a few months of ancestor searches. Read more >>

Lesson 4: Climbing Your Family Tree

Starting your first search: all about pedigree charts

Perhaps the most bewildering of all genealogical charts; the Ancestor or Pedigree Chart, is a constant of family tree building. It is necessary to all genealogists…and one of the easiest things to misunderstand. For many beginning genealogists is seems that it was simply designed to confound and confuse.

In this lesson you will begin by mastering the concepts and uses of the various styles of pedigree charts and by its finish you will be reading them and filling them out like a Pro. Read more >>

Lesson 5: What’s in a Name?

All about surname searches

In this amusing lesson you will learn how and why surnames developed and how to discover the origins of your own unique surname;

…and while this lesson is certainly entertaining you will gain an indispensable understanding of the role of surnames in differing cultures. Read more >>

Lesson 6: What’s in a First Name?

How to use names in searches as hints and clues

With Genealogy Beginner’s 6th lesson in the series you will discover the importance of the role first names or Christian names play in tracing your ancestors.

This lesson is filled with surprising and informative facts that will have you hot on the trail of your past generations. Lesson six serves up a concise guide to naming patterns and points out the significance of clues held in middle names that you would never think to look for.

This lesson not only helps steer you toward revealing your next generation it will also help you guard against going down a dead end path by providing some lesser know facts about historical naming practices. Read more >>

Lesson 7: Searching by Place

Where did they go? Where is that?

This lesson may be not only one of the most beneficial genealogy classes in this series, but in any genealogy course.

Filled with critical details and advice for tracing migration routes and immigration patterns, the information provided in this lesson is needed for any successful research where your ancestors have moved around, whether it has been around the globe or around a country. Read more >>

Lesson 8: A Look at Genealogy Software

The good, the bad and the ugly

This lesson is not another product review comparing brand X to Brand Y; It is an aid that explains in no nonsense terms, what genealogy software is, what it does and what it does not do.

This lesson is designed solely for the purpose of helping the beginning genealogist decide for them selves if they need a genealogy software program and if so; help sort through the pro’s, con’s, methods of use and models of application available in an ever growing and changing market place. Read more >>