Monday, January 24, 2011

Kids family tree placemat: keep their appetite for family history growing!

As you know I am always looking for new ways to get my kids interested in genealogy, and have already created various project that they love, but every now and then they need something new to keep the interest alive.
I was thinking of a way to "feed" them family history and I came up with a family tree place mat!
This will surely give them an appetite to know more about their ancestors and will hopefully start nice conversations at the family table.
I decided to use the 11x14 page format, which I will then laminate to protect it from water and any inevitable mess.
The boys have helped me pick some of the embellishments like the moon and the dogs, but what really caught their attention and got  them all excited was being put on the swing under the tree!
They couldn't wait for me to finish creating, and my 4 year old just wanted me to hurry up and make his, since I started with the one for my 6 years old!
Once I made the one for my first born it was pretty much a breeze to just swap pictures, name and background, (even the dogs as they wished), to personalize it for my other children.
As you can see I added leaves to Jacob's tree. I am not sure yet if I like it better with or without leaves...
What do you think?

My children  are eager to have them on the table, as soon as I will have published them and after I will have laminated them once they are here.
I didn't make one for Mattia yet, since he is so little, and I think it would be more appropriate to use a picture of him when he is at least a toddler, and he can actually sit at the table and eat.
My children are so spoiled when it comes to their genealogy!

I am thinking to make it double sided, I am trying to come up with some fast fact genealogy games, maybe tic tac toe,  matching pictures with names, or places or jobs, matching couples or a game that we can all do together as a family, like bingo with family faces, a variation of guess who... 

If you have a different idea of a family game, maybe one that you are already playing in your home, or one that you would like to play that uses family pictures, I would love to hear it!

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3 comments:

Lisa Wallen Logsdon said...

Teaching children about their own family history from an early age should be something every parent does. You have some inspiring ideas!

my Heritage Happens said...

I absolutely love your idea and how they are coming out! Clever!

Jim (Hidden Genealogy Nuggets Blog) said...

I love moments I have to teach my children about their ancestors. This is a great idea.

Regards, Jim
Family Tree Fun at Hidden Genealogy Nuggets

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