Questions to ask about their childhood

Questions about the early years also reach the furthest back. When your grandmother describes her own parents, you are hearing about people born well over a century ago from someone who sat at their table. When your dad tells you what he played after school, you meet the boy he was before he had any responsibilities at all.

The questions below are a small sample to get you started. The ones with links lead to a full guide with advice on how to ask, alternative wordings, follow-up ideas and an example answer. Ask for sights, sounds and smells as well as facts, because the senses are how childhood is remembered. A floor plan drawn on scrap paper or an old photograph on the table will bring back more than any list.

Childhood questions to try

• When and where were you born?
• What is your earliest memory?
• What did the house you grew up in look, sound and smell like?
• What were your parents like?
• What games did you play, and who did you play them with?
• What did you want to be when you grew up?
• Did you have brothers or sisters, and what were they like as children?
• What did your family eat for dinner most nights?
• Who was the grown-up you looked up to most as a child?
• What smells, sounds or foods take you straight back to your childhood?
• What was your favorite toy?

Start with a place. Once someone is standing in their childhood kitchen in their mind, the people and the stories walk in on their own.