Indexing
The young women in our ward want to learn how to do indexing. The problem is that they can't read hand-writing and they are just getting started so they need to have a batch that's typed and easy to read, and I see that there is nothing provided right now in the beginners file for indexing. Could you please make sure there is something there for these girls to work on on Wednesday, April 19th. Thank you.
Answers
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FamilySearch does not seem to have this type of record available, at present. But, what a terrible indictment of the (U.S.) education system that cursive appears to be no longer taught in schools! I don't know what the position is in other countries, but I don't see this as a problem in the U.K.
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Yes, it is sad that something as basic as handwriting is not part of the school curriculum. I'll see if I can reserve something from the intermediate level for Wednesday.
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In addition, a neatly printed typed set of records will most likely have been designated for indexing by OCR, not by humans.
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There was something there neatly typed just in the last few days, but others got to it first.
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Have the YW try Review Names under Get Involved on FamilySearch.org or try it on the phone app. A lot of the records are in cursive but this project is a little easier to do. I think it's a great way to involve youth--they often have smartphones and like to try new things on them.
Here is the link:
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Thank you for the suggestion, Mary, but our girls are English speaking. This won't work for our group. The hand-writing and the unfamiliar names would just be frustrating.
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@cathryn louise Hi, the Handwriting Examples on the indexing toolbar should be helpful. You can enlarge it and make a snip like the one below to print for each girl.
Also, you could enlist the help of parents, grandparents and elderly indexers like me who would be delighted to work with the younger generation, plus you can use this forum to share batch and I for one would be happy to be online to help, just post the time and time zone for your activity. Best wishes, Mary ps I'm on mountain daylight time 😎
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Hi Mary. We're on eastern daylight savings these days. If you can guide us through this it would be terrific. Our activity is scheduled for 7:30 next Tuesday evening. There should be about 10 young women plus leaders and other adults. So will you lead us remotely on a screen? I'm also a retiree, but my skills using the computer wouldn't allow me to lead what you are talking about.
Hi Mary. I found a beginner batch of indexing on FamilySearch a couple of days ago. I don't know who put them there, but thank you to whoever did. Me and some of the leaders in the Ward have reserved 2 batches each to do with the young women tomorrow evening. We're looking forward to a fun and inspiring evening together.
So the activity will begin at 7:00 Wednesday evening. You are welcome to attend if you like, but we'll do an activity another night where we learn to interpret handwriting.
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Hi @cathryn louise Thanks for the invite for tomorrow (4/19) evening. The only way I know of attending your meeting would be if you are putting the meeting on Zoom or however the Church did it for meetings during CoVid and that would require links and passwords -- which we wouldn't be able to to share in this open forum. However, if you've reserved batches in the US, Ohio—Stillbirth (Birth) Records, you shouldn't need any extra help as they appear to be mostly typewritten records.
What you can do is show your group how to use the Share Batch feature and this Community Forum to ask questions while indexing the batches you've reserved. I will use the same time period to do indexing of my own and check the forum every few minutes for anything from you.
Also, please check your Family Search email Wed for a message from me and we'll talk about interpreting handwriting another time. Mary 😎
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