Family history, one new shoot at a time.
Shoots is a coach for learning and doing family history with FamilySearch. It walks you through each step, remembers who you are working on, and points you to the right page. It never changes the tree. You do.
Ask to join the early group See how the tree stays safe
Shoots is in early development. The coach is not open to the public yet.
A coach keeps track so you can think
Family history means holding many people, dates and half-finished searches in your head at once. Most of us lose the thread between one sitting and the next.
Shoots keeps a focus card for whoever you are working on: the question you are trying to answer, what you have already tried, and the next small step. When you come back, you start where you stopped.
The card is yours. You write it in your own words, with the coach asking questions along the way.
It asks. You decide.
A shared family tree is only as good as the care each person takes with it. So the coach does not hand you answers about your ancestors. It asks the questions a careful researcher would ask, and it leaves the judgment, and any impression you feel about your own family, with you.
When you want help with wording, it can draft a reason statement or a note to a relative. A draft is always marked as written by AI, and it goes nowhere until you read it, change it and put it in yourself.
An example conversation.
You FamilySearch is showing me a record hint for Anna. Should I attach it?
Coach Let's look before you click. Open the record itself, not only the summary. What does it say about her age and where she was born?
You Age 28, born in Denmark.
Coach That fits what you wrote on her card. What on the page could tell you this is a different Anna? Who else is in the household?
You A husband, Niels. I don't have a Niels.
Coach Good catch. That is worth settling first. Whether it is the same Anna is your call to make. Would you like to add "find a marriage record for Anna and Niels" as your next step?
Programs you can follow
Pick a program, or tell the coach what you hope to do and set your own goal. Each program teaches one skill on your own family, at your own pace.
Find your focus person
Choose one ancestor and one question, so you are not pulled ten ways at once.
Look before you click a hint
Learn to read the record behind a hint and decide for yourself whether it belongs.
Attach your first source
Add a record to a person and write a plain reason that the next relative can follow.
Before you merge
The questions to settle before joining two people into one, since a wrong merge is hard to undo.
Keep a research log
Write down what you searched and what you did not find, so nobody repeats the work.
Pick up where you left off
A short review at the start of each sitting: who, what question, what next.
These are the first programs planned. They may change as early members use them.
How the tree stays safe
The FamilySearch Family Tree is shared by everyone. One careless change lands on thousands of relatives. Shoots is built so the AI cannot be the one who makes it.
What the coach will never do
- Change, add, merge or delete anything in the Family Tree.
- Click, attach or submit anything for you on FamilySearch.
- Tell you two people are the same person, or that someone is your ancestor.
- Make up a person, a date, a place, a source or a citation.
- Create a portrait or a life story of an ancestor.
- Count names. No points, streaks or rewards for how many people you add.
- Hide that a draft was written by AI.
What the AI can see
| The AI sees | The AI does not see |
|---|---|
| What you type to the coach | Your FamilySearch password. You would sign in on FamilySearch's own page. |
| Your goals, focus cards and journal | Tree data that Shoots fetches from FamilySearch. Ordinary software shows it on your screen, beside the coach. |
| Which program step you are on | Records about living people, or temple ordinance details. |
FamilySearch sign-in is not available in Shoots yet. We are applying to FamilySearch for access, and the table describes how Shoots will handle that data. If FamilySearch's rules allow more or less than this, we will follow their rules and say so here.
We follow the five principles of the Coalition for Responsible AI in Genealogy: accuracy, disclosure, privacy, education and compliance.
Join the early group
We are starting with a small group of people who want to learn family history and are willing to tell us what helps. Write to us and say a little about where you are: brand new, coming back after years, or helping someone else.