by the PCDads

No matter what their ages, children are usually fascinated by stories of Grandpa's trek from Wisconsin to California as a young man, or how Great Aunt Tilly raised eight children in a two-room house. Unfortunately, parents don't always have much background about their own extended families. With a PC and the Internet, you and your children can search your roots together, and create personal, customized family records. It's a great way to introduce older kids to the concept of research, and with today's multimedia bells and whistles you can really bring your family story to life. Here are a few tips to get started.

Choose an organizational "album." Several software programs, like Family Tree Maker from Broderbund, Ultimate Family Tree Platinum from Palladium Interactive and Generations Deluxe Edition from Sierra Home, make it easy to organize facts and automatically generate family tree charts that can include photos as well as text. Some of these programs come with archival CDs that help you search for long lost relatives missing from the family radar screen, and some offer easy-to-use audio and video capabilities.

Get it from the horse's mouth: It's fun for kids to get information and stories straight from family members. Give them a small tape recorder, a few tips, and let them "interview" Grandma or Grandpa. Show them how documents like birth certificates, obituaries and letters provide valuable facts. Scan these documents into your family tree scrapbook, while entering colorful stories, along with audio and video of your relatives. Then you can hear your favorite Aunt's comments in her own voice.

Go online: Use the Internet to find and contact other people who are tracing the same surname. Cyndi's List of Genealogy Sites on the Internet (www.cyndislist.com), and the National Genealogical Society (www.ngsgenealogy.org) are two starting points to locate genealogy bulletin boards and mailing lists. Older children and teens can do more complicated research, such as the National Archives and Records Administration (www. nara.gov/geneaology/genindex.html) in Washington, D.C. to look up census records.

Document your history: Don't forget to create your own bit of historical documentation for generations to come. Talk about special events in your family's life, and add highlights of these stories in the album. Eventually your grandkids will be asking their parents about you.

Create a web site: Consider creating a (Fill in the Blank) family web site. When extended family members everywhere can access this tapestry of information, they are likely to become more excited about contributing their own threads in different ways. A video clip from Uncle Mike's visit to the ancestral home in Ireland, for example, is sure to enrich your child's sense of personal history.

Above all, work closely with your children on these projects. After all, this is a family project, one with lasting memories.