CHAPTER 3: Let's Talk About...Us! How to
do Great Family Interviews
Oral History Questions
Here's a good list of interviewing questions on a variety of topics. Included
are growing up, religion, the family's physical characteristics, occupations,
historical events, and immigration stories.
www.genealogy.com/00000030.html
Journal Jar: Recipe Questions for a Life History
This site has more than 400 questions for family interviews. But it also offers
a clever family-history project: a "Journal Jar." This is a different way to inspire
someone to tell you his life story. You place family-life questions on strips
of paper into a jar. A family member can then pull them out, one at a time, and
write down (or tell you) his or her answers.
www.omnicron.com/~fluzby/sister-share/journal.htm
What to Ask
This site presents dozens of questions to help you get started with your interview and give you an idea of how life in your family used to be. Print
out the list and use it to interview older family members.
www.youthsource.ab.ca/teacher_resources/oral_question.html
Guide for Interviewing Family Members
Genealogist Dick Eastman assembled this collection of family-history interview
questions. Topics covered include grandparents, childhood, the family house, friends
and games, school, the family philosophy, and others.
www.rootsweb.com/~flgso/intvwqus.htm
