Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Using visual media to promote your society

I posted recently about our CVGS/CVPL "Discover Your Family History Day" workshop, held last weekend. As part of this effort, we had the opportunity to put a genealogy/family history display in the library foyer. One of our newer members, Jeanne, had some great ideas, and volunteered to manage the effort. The window has caught the eye of many people, and perhaps some of them may want to learn more about genealogy through CVGS.

The photo below shows the display window (it's about 4 feet high by 6 feet wide):



We also wanted to decorate the conference room we used for the briefing and consulting with the attendees. Our newsletter editor, Shirley, blew up some of her documents and pictures and put them on one conference room wall:



Another newer member, Ken, makes interesting and informative wall charts of his ancestry for his family in his spare time. He brought some of them in and mounted them on the other wall. Here is a photo of some of Ken's work:



In the planning for this workshop, we learned that many of our members have talents we didn't know about, and they used those talents to make the workshop successful. In the process, the attendees and our society members who helped saw some wonderful displays of genealogy and family history.

More and more, we are reminded that learning through visual media is more powerful than learning through lectures or the printed word.

Does your local society have people with hidden talents? How do you encourage your members to reveal and use those talents?

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