We have some great courses coming up for you in March:

Practicalities of a One Name Study

Tutor: Julie Goucher 
Start date: 9th March 2021
Course length: 5 weeks (4 teaching weeks and a reading / practice week)

* COURSE OF THE MONTH * 

The course is designed to enable students to explore the practical steps of maintaining and developing their one-name study through a variety of mediums and to give some context to the various considerations they will need to explore.

Lesson Headings:
– Understanding and making the best use of spreadsheets in your study
– Genealogical Software, what to consider
– Online Trees and other software
– The next steps: Preservation and Sharing

Scottish Research Online

Tutor: Chris Paton
Start date: 1st March 2021
Course length: 5 weeks

Scotland was one of the first countries to digitise its major family history records collections for accessibility online, and continues to this day to use such resources to promote a worldwide interest in family history for those with Caledonian connections. This course describes the major sites and record types that you will encounter in your research, and how to analyse the results. Most importantly it will inspire you to actively pursue your interest in Scottish genealogy and take it to the next level.

Wills and Administrations; the riches of probate records

Tutor: Linda Newey
Start date: 1st March 2021
Course length: 4 weeks
* FULLY BOOKED * Booking now for September 2021

Advanced Methods and Reports

Tutor: Karen Cummings
Start date: 1st March 2021
Course length: 4 weeks

This course provides students with the techniques and tools to ensure the best possible evidence for their pedigrees and trees, and is suitable for hobby and professional genealogists alike.

We look at problems of identity and interpretation, standards for evaluation and analysis, and how to build a case for proof. We will consider the display of charts and genealogy research reports, showing the conventions and standards that are used and that enable written research to be of a high scholarly standard. Students will also practise writing short research reports.

Before the Modern Census – Name-rich sources from 1690 to 1837

Tutor: Else Churchill
Start date: 2nd March 2021
Course length: 4 weeks

What do you do when the nominal census records that you have used so much are no longer there, when you cannot obtain names, ages, birthplaces and the household address of a family? And how do you supplement the deficiencies of parish registers?

Your attention should turn to a variety of lists which at least reveal where someone lived at a particular time. Though this seems scant information, such facts can be vitally important especially in those years when children were not born and christened.

Over four lessons you will learn about the introduction of newspapers, the earliest efforts at census taking, and what other records are considered to be useful census substitutes. Census substitutes are often quite local in scope and purpose. Many will be explained and advice will be given on how to search for local lists. You will come away with an understanding of how to make the most of census substitutes, some new online search skills, and an ability to assess and access these sources.

Church and Community, Selected records 1540 – 1800

Tutor: Emma Jolly
Start date: 3rd March 2021
Course length: 4 weeks

This course gives you the tools to understand the nature, jurisdictions and administrations under which different types of community existed in the past, and seeks to bring genealogy and local history closer together.

You’ve found your ancestor in the parish registers, but was that parish rural or urban, a town or borough? How did that affect your ancestors’ lives and how will it affect your research? We look at the records of towns, such as burgess rolls, and the difficulties and pitfalls in tracing our early ancestors who migrated from rural areas / parishes to towns.

You will learn about the many records of the diocese and its court, including visitation records, marriage licences and probate records. Also in this category are the records of disputes heard in the church or ecclesiastical courts, often know as bawdy courts due to the nature of cases they heard.

Finally, we look at the records of boroughs in detail, including guilds, freemen, voting rights and merchant guilds.

Are You Sitting Comfortably? Writing and Telling Your Family History

Tutor: Janet Few
Start date: 15th March 2021
Course length: 5 weeks

Writing your family history is the logical step after genealogical research, and sometimes while research is still in progress. To avoid gathering dust, a family story must be written to appeal to a broad spectrum of relatives and readers, to answer questions of relationships and to stimulate the sharing of knowledge. The history of a family blends a range of information: the ancestors and their stories, the places they knew, and the context of contemporary conditions and event. A good story, based on sound research, is a focal point of a family re-union, and it makes a great gift.

This five-week course begins with advice on making decisions about what to write about, and what to include, and how to make some order out of the potential chaos of information. It goes on to discover the historical context and how to add interest into your story with background about what was happening nationally and locally and how this might have affected your ancestors. It looks at how knowledge about occupations can bring an ancestor to life, and how and why social history helps you to make sense of it all and frame your story. Finally in week five, you will discover how to add photos and other illustrations as well as options for publishing.

If you wish to receive feedback and assessment on your writing, there is the option to submit a piece of writing of up to 3,000 words for marking. The best of the class may even be published on this blog!