The Family Tree Assignment

Sometimes the best assignments are created by accident. Global Business is a new class for me this year. We were studying a chaper on culture, and how our nuclear and extended family shapes the values and beliefs that are then extended into the business environment. Kind of as a "what should we do today" assignment I asked all my students to create family trees going back to their grandparents. I asked them to include education and occupations of their relatives, and also asked them to write a paragraph sharing a "story" that had been passed down in their family.

Several of my students didn't seem to know how to begin. A few came up and talked to me in private. "Ms. Clayton-I don't know my father" one began. Another shared "I haven't had any contact with my mother since I was 2-can I put my stepmother?" I calmed some nerves, and told them to include as much as they knew, and told them the point wasn't to make anyone uncomfortable--it was to show there was no "typical family" unit. I also gave them the weekend to go home and ask their family questions.

The real surprise came when it was time to present the projects to the class. I shared mine first. I mentioned I had an aunt that had been married 7 times and all of her children had different fathers. I saw several heads nod. They understood this.

A girl I was call "A" stood up to begin. "This is my Uncle Buttface. No one knows his real name. Everyone calls him Uncle Buttface. This is my aunt. She is a prostitute and on drugs. This is my other uncle. My dad said to write his occupation down as "mooch". Trust me--this girl was not trying to be funny. This was her real family. She closed with "there are some people in my family I am not proud of. But they are still my family and I want to talk about them."

It was awesome she went first. Hands waved in the air to talk. Even my shyest students spoke. Here are some priceless excerpts:

"I never knew until this project that my grandfather wrote poetry. He wrote me a poem when I was a baby before he died. My mother found it and gave it to me. It made me cry"--JT

"My parents met when they both worked at Old San Francisco Steakhouse as waiters. A cool thing about my family is three of my aunts were the girls that rode on the swing and rang the bells. My whole family was sad when they tore it down and built a Target"--ES

"I don't know who my dad is--I have never met him. That makes me sad but when I told my mom I wanted to know his name for this project she told it to me. That is the first time I heard his first name is the same as mine. It makes me feel I know him even though I don't."--HA

"I am from China and my parents were only allowed to have one child-me. Some relatives told my parents to give me away because I was a girl but they didn't-I am so happy they liked girls as well as boys"--XW

" None of the people on my mothers side of the family have gone to college. There is a lot of pressure on me because of that. I hope I will make my family proud."--DN

"My grandfather was a train engineer. He died 10 years ago. Now, when anyone in the family sees a train they honk their car horn to remember my grandfather"--MG

How priceless, and what a wonderful experience for both my students and their families. Talk to your children. Share your family stories, even if they aren't pretty. It is what makes us all unique.