Watch FREE genealogy and writing lessons
Are you interested in researching your ancestry, or writing a family history, or publishing a family history or biography or "how to" book?
Click on the links below to watch free genealogy "how to" lessons and writing "how to" lessons by internationally acclaimed author and genealogist, Carol Baxter.
FREE LESSON: Tracing your Family History
This video is a humorous beginners' guide to genealogical research.
Lesson synopsis:
This light-hearted introductory lesson, filled with genealogy humour and cartoons, offers beginners the opportunity to learn the fundamentals of family history research irrespective of their ancestors’ places of origin.
It also offers experienced genealogists an amusing break from the information overload of the average genealogy lesson or conference.
Duration: 50 minutes
FREE LESSON: I want to write ... something!
This video is the first lesson in the Words on the Page course.
Lesson synopsis:
Is writing an art or a craft? This is one of the big picture questions this lesson poses as we begin our writing journey. We also explore our history-writing personality types, which have an impact on our attitude towards tackling the writing journey.
As we narrow our focus, we examine the different literary forms and genres available and suitable for genealogists. We position these on the history-writing spectrum.
Finally, we talk about the four main literary styles we can use to communicate our family information.
This lesson provides a literary foundation. We begin building on that foundation in the remainder of the Words on the Page course.
Duration: 39 minutes
FREE LESSON: Crafting Compelling Family Histories
This video provides an overview of the Crafting Compelling Family Histories course.
Lesson synopsis:
Most family histories read like a series of encyclopaedia entries. But who reads an encyclopaedia from start to finish?
Which begs the question: Why not?
Because they are fact-filled and date-filled which makes them tiring to read.
So how do we craft compelling family histories when our research has turned up little more than a list of facts?
Exploring how to do so is the aim of this course.
Duration: 18 minutes
FREE LESSON: Words, Words, Words
This video is the first lesson in the Words, Words, Words course.
Lesson synopsis:
The easiest way to empower our prose and to engage our readers is at the basic sentence level in our prose. The Words, Words, Words course explores the "parts of speech" of the English language. This first lesson is an overview lesson.
Duration: 21 minutes
FREE LESSON: Punctuation packs a Punch!
This video is the first lesson in the Punctuation Packs a Punch! course.
Lesson synopsis:
Can you imagine trying to read a page with no punctuation? No capital letters. No full stops or other sentence terminators. Not even a space between words. That’s what scrolls looked like in the past—screeds and screeds of unseparated letters. The reader (or speaker) had to work out where the words and sentences and paragraphs ended. Thus, punctuation developed to help us read the written word.
As so often happens, punctuation eventually developed a life of its own. It does so much more than merely help us understand a passage of prose. Indeed, it can change the meaning of that group of words entirely. Moreover, while some punctuation marks do little more than assist us with the craft of writing, others offer us a valuable tool in the art of writing. So join us as we explore the surprisingly large number of punctuation marks in the English language.
Duration: 26 minutes
FREE LESSON: I want to publish ... something
This video is the first lesson in the Publish or Perish course.
Lesson synopsis:
At some point in our genealogical research journey, many of us realise that we'd like to publish the results of our research in some form or another so family members can access it. But what are our publishing options?
This is an overview lesson, exploring the publishing industry as a whole and looking at some of our writing and publishing options within the industry.
Duration: 25 minutes
