Entertainment or Education -- the genealogy conference experience

As soon as I got back from Utah and my visit to FamilySearch, I taughttwo classes at the Fall Genealogy Workshop of the Family History Societyof Arizona. The conference seemed very well attended but being at agenealogy conference raises some issues, including whether or notattending a genealogy class is more entertainment than education. Theclasses I taught were on specific software products and it wasinteresting that more than a few of the attendees had purchased thesoftware at a previous convention and had either never loaded it ontheir computer or after loading it on, had never used it.

In the regard, I reflect on all of the many hundreds of genealogyclasses I have taught over the past few years. Some of the classes havebeen attended by the same people, on the same subjects, time after time.Yet, each time I teach the same class over, I get similar comments andover time, when I ask if anyone has used the program or whatever, thepercentage of actual use never seems to increase. For example, Iregularly teach a class on using Google for Genealogy. Even though Irepeat the topic almost two or three times a month and some of the samepeople attend the class repeatedly, they still never seem to spend thetime to learn a little about Google themselves. So, is the classentertainment or education? I guess I would have to conclude that it islargely entertainment.

Read more...

Member Blogs

Entertainment or Education -- the genealogy conference experience

Comments