Indexing again

Last night for mutual we did some indexing. We knew that 2 (half) of our girls would be gone (one of them is getting her patriarchal blessing, yay!), so we kept it small. The other 2 girls are fairly new to our young women, so we decided to teach them how to index. We had to sign one girl up for an account, and then we set to work. I just brought my laptop to the church and signed them into the software. They shared a batch of British names. When they were done one girl, who is pretty sarcastic, told us that was fun, and we laughed a little. But then she said "No, that really was kind of fun." Indexing really is a fun activity.

We also did some more planning for our YWIE night coming up. We are getting set to send out invitations, including to some sisters in the ward who we feel exemplify certain of the YW values. I'm excited to see how it turns out.

Family History

Last night for mutual we worked on our family history. A few weeks ago on Sunday I handed out pedigree charts to all the girls and asked them to work on filling them in for this activity. Then I showed the girls how to use familysearch.org (note: there is also new.familysearch.org). Since we already had our log ins from our indexing activity, we didn't have much trouble getting on (just a few forgotten passwords). The girls were able to fill in some of their charts, but not all of it. With more help from their parents and grandparents, I think they will be able to. I told them that once they fill in their charts, we will be able to print a fan graphic, similar to this:

I also really like this idea from The Red Headed Hostess. The blog includes free printables.

I also challenged the girls to be able to find an ancestors name to take the temple to do baptisms for. I really hope they take this challenge because it is such a neat experience to do the work for your own ancestors. It really helps you feel close to them. (For those who may be wondering, the LDS church does proxy baptisms for the dead. You can learn more about that here).

This activity also allowed us to work on Personal Progress. Individual Worth #6 says:

    When you participate in family history, you come to understand your identity and individual worth. Visit with your living relatives to learn as much information about your family history as possible. Then complete a pedigree chart of your family and list the temple ordinances that have been completed for each person.

This was a wonderful activity and the girls had fun, as did some of the leaders who discovered that their family has been working on their family history. We will have to do it again soon to help the girls be able to find more of their ancestors. I'm thinking a trip to our stake family history library is in store. And I really hope we can make those cute trees once the girls have their charts filled in!

Indexing

Last night for mutual our youth combined per a special request from the Bishop. Originally I just had this planned for the young women, but the bishopric is trying to push family history to all the youth in our ward, as are the apostles also (see https://www.lds.org/youth/family-history).

I myself feel really intimated by trying to search for ancestors, plus my parents have a good handle on our family tree, but I still feel like I should be involved in family history, and indexing is a wonderful and easy way to do that. Indexing involves viewing handwritten records (marriage, birth and death certificates, military enlistment forms, censuses, etc...) and typing them into a database so that those who  are searching for their ancestors can easily just do a text search through these records rather than spending hours looking through microfiche. Here are some great videos to introduce the topic: http://bcove.me/628xt280 and http://bcove.me/41ok3bjr

I found a great slideshow to use for our activity here: http://www.sugardoodle.net/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=8808

On the Sunday before, I asked our Bishop for the membership numbers of all our youth so that each could create their own lds.org account and sign into the indexing program at their homes. We set a goal to do 1000 names as a group by July 4th. I was a little bummed because they just indexed the 1 billionth record a few days before our activity and I was hoping to use that as some motivation for the youth. Oh well. It was fun activity and I know some of the youth are excited to get into family history.



To download the indexing software, go here (you do have to download software to your computer):https://indexing.familysearch.org/newuser/nugetstarted.jsf. At this time they are working on building apps for phones and tablets, but for now you will need a computer.

For more resources, go here: https://indexing.familysearch.org/public/publications.jsf?lng=en-US

Also, here is a tutorial to take you through indexing (it also has a handout you can print out): http://broadcast.lds.org/elearning/FHD/Local_Support/FamilySearchIndexing/EN/Indexing/Lesson1/page8985.html