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This site gets you thinking about strategies for structuring a meaningful interview with a family member. Some of you may particularly appreciate the highly structured approach-- with forms to fill out ahead of time. From the site: "What questions should I ask? Here's a strategy for coming up with questions based on what you know about the person. Create a rough structure of the person's life. List what you know about the person. List what you know about the time period. Look at it and then let the questions suggest themselves."

Like "This I believe", Story Corps is another NPR program that sends out long "shoots" into the community--- reaching out to "ordinary people" by way of valuing their stories, their narratives. It is, in other words, another powerful example of what the word "public" stands for in "national public radio". Story Corps mostly supports and encourages families to preserve the narratives that define them, and bind them. Most interviews and recordings are a joint or collaborative effort between older and younger family members, unlike "This I believe" which celebrates the individual. On this site, there are useful guides to planning interviews. I hope that some of you will consider using the "Story Corps" model and guidelines for the family component.

From the Story Corps site, ways to get you ready-- and enthused-- about talking with your family member. From the site: "These questions are merely suggestions for getting a good conversation going. We encourage you to use the ones you like and to come up with your own. This list is in no particular order. You may choose one of the categories below, or scroll through and read them all"

This is an example of a class project done locally by high school students. What Did You Do in the War, Grandma? was developed and produced at South Kingston High School by Linda Wood, an oral historian, and the school's librarian. The interviews were conducted and recorded in the Spring of 1989 with the support of a grant from the Rhode Island Committee for the Humanities.