Homeschool Lesson With Genealogy

Add a bit of genealogy to your homeschool lesson

ALERT!!!! The kids are out of school and many of you are homeschooling!!! Sometimes to make learning different and fun, kids need a reason to want to learn it. How about mixing genealogy and social studies together? Help them learn geography and throw in a history lesson while you are at it. But, it is all based on a family story. Bring history alive with people they are related to. That would have made geography and history much more fun to learn when I was in school.

Geography, history, and genealogy!

Look up an ancestor that may have an exciting story. Find a picture of the person if possible. Having a face to put with the information will make it even more real. Find a map, it can be online or one you have in your house. Have your children find the country the relative came from. What continent is the country on? What town did they live in? Then learn a little about that country around the time your ancestor lived there. What did the country produce? When did it become a country? Did the name ever change? Really the sky’s the limit.

A photo can put a face to your ancestor's name making it even more exciting for the kids

In these uncertain times we can teach our children about our ancestors, and in many cases show them they also went through hard times. Imagine living when everyone got horrible diseases but people came up with ways to eradicate them. Imagine living through the Great Depression. Hard times are not new. There have been pandemics before, and we are so blessed to have such wonderful advanced medicine today. These lessons can be taught through history and genealogy.

Tracy Hall

Tracy is an owner, a genealogy researcher, and author. She has a bachelor's degree from the University of Illinois and a master's degree from Grand Canyon University. She has done genealogical research in the U.S., England, and Ireland. She has been actively researching family histories for over 20 years. She loves working with clients, breaking down brick walls, seeing the places where hers and your ancestors lived, learning about their jobs and work, and researching immigration and migration patterns. She is the Holder of the Tree in several of her family lines and has been for decades.