How to Use Thanksgiving for Family Tree Research

Thanksgiving is a time to focus on gratitude and spending time with family. This makes it a perfect time to jumpstart your genealogy and family tree research. You can learn more from sitting around the table with family members and asking good questions than spending hours online with your laptop. 

Discussing family history at Thanksgiving can also be a wonderful way to foster intergenerational discussion and to provide your family with a creative and fun way to pass the holiday time together. Thanksgiving is a perfect time to start family tree research for several reasons. With the winter holidays approaching, this will hopefully enable you to have extra quality time with the different sides of your family to delve into old stories, memories, and family names. Starting the traditions of creating and growing your family tree at Thanksgiving will provide you with activities and conversation topics that can continue during all of your winter holiday celebrations.

Thanksgiving is also an ideal time to begin family tree related conversations because it is a holiday rich with family traditions. Maybe you’ve used the same stuffing recipe for as long as you can remember, but you don’t know where it originated. Perhaps it’s a tradition to play a family game of touch football on the lawn each year or to display a turkey figurine that has been in your family for ages. Now is the time to start asking questions about those traditions. Where did these traditions come from? What are the memories associated with them? Which family members were the key players?

There is so much to learn about your family during Thanksgiving and the winter holidays that follow with a bit of intention and creativity throughout these months. Here are five ways to use your Thanksgiving holiday as a way to get started with your family tree research:

Click here to see the five ways to get started with your family tree research via my article on Family Education.