The 34 templates are worked cases with their notes attached
Every template in the library is a fictional or historical family with a case note that explains each line on the chart, and all 34 open in the editor with no account at all. The clinical set runs from a single mother with two children to a four-generation case of bipolar disorder and suicide loss. The medical set covers diabetes, heart disease, asthma, hereditary cancers, Huntington’s disease and alcohol use across generations. The famous set draws the Freud, Brontë, Tudor, Roosevelt, Beethoven and British royal families from public sources.
For a class, each template is a worked case. A student reads the note, covers the chart, draws the family from the note alone, and then compares the drawing with the template. Because the note states every fact, the comparison is unambiguous. The single mother template below is where most courses begin, with one household, a non-custodial father at a distance and a boy acting out since the separation.
The symbol chart is the handout for the first lesson
The Templates page has a symbol chart as a free PDF and PNG, with the 59 symbols and connections of McGoldrick, Gerson and Petry on one sheet. It covers the person symbols, the union lines and their endings, the parent lines for biological, adopted, foster and step relationships, the marks for conditions and substance use, the household groups and the emotional lines. Because the same key is printed on every chart the editor exports, the handout and the charts agree.
The emotional lines are where a first lesson spends most of its time, and the notation reference on this site draws each one with an example. Connected, close and fused are a graded series, hostile and its combinations with close and fused are another, and cutoff and cutoff repaired are a third. Setting each series side by side in the first lesson makes the gradations clear before anyone draws one.
Connected
Close
Fused
Hostile
Close-hostile
Cutoff
A class works in the browser with nothing to install
Genogram Builder runs in the browser on any computer or tablet, so a class uses the machines it already has, and a student draws one genogram of up to 50 people without creating an account. Work stays in the browser until it is saved to an account, so on a shared lab computer the student exports a PDF or the JSON backup before the end of the session and reopens the JSON next time. Students who want to keep several charts across a course create a free account, which holds two genograms of up to 50 people each.
A lesson built on a template runs in one sequence. The student opens the template, reads the case note, draws the family on a blank chart from the note, compares it with the template, and exports the drawing. Nothing in the sequence asks for an account.
- Open the template
Choose a case from the library and read its note beside the chart.
- Draw from the note
Start a blank chart and draw the family from the note alone, without looking at the template.
- Compare
Open the template again and find every line that differs.
- Export
Save a PDF or a JSON backup before leaving a shared computer.
A draft from a case note teaches what the notes leave out
The draft feature is a teaching tool as well as a shortcut. A student writes a family as prose, pastes it into the notes panel, and sees the draft return every person, union, parent line and emotional line it found, each with the sentence that supports it and each marked as stated or inferred, with the items it could not decide set aside. A marriage without a year, a tie described in words the notation does not use and a child whose parents are not named all come back as items to resolve.
The draft does not make the chart for the student in any sense that matters for assessment. It draws only what is written, so a thin case note gives a thin chart, and the writing of a complete case note is the skill the exercise tests. A visitor without an account has one draft, and a free account has five a month with four follow-up changes each, so an exercise built on drafting is planned around those numbers.
Your notes
Ellie Hawkins, born 2009, is the index person. Her brother Jack, born 2006, is close to her. Their parents, Paul Hawkins, born 1971, and Helen Hawkins, born 1974, married in 2003 and are distant. Paul’s siblings are Carol, born 1969, and Neil, born 1973, who are in conflict over their mother’s care. Paul was married before, to Dawn Reilly.
Found in the notes
- Ellie Hawkins, 2009, index
- Jack Hawkins, 2006
- Paul Hawkins, 1971
- Helen Hawkins, 1974
- Carol Hawkins, 1969
- Neil Hawkins, 1973
- Jack and Ellie, close
- Paul and Helen, married 2003, distant
- Carol and Neil, hostile
- Set aside, Paul and Dawn Reilly, dates not given
On the chart
Exports arrive as PDF with the key for marking
A finished chart exports as PNG or PDF with the key printed on it and, on the free plan, a small watermark in the corner, which does not affect marking. The PDF is the file to ask for. Where you want to inspect the chart rather than a picture of it, ask for the JSON backup as well, which reopens in the editor with every line and note, so that a disputed line can be checked against the student’s own notes.
For a written examination the printable sheets on the Templates page do the same job on paper. The blank three generation sheet and the guided sheet are free PDFs with the key printed on them, and a case note from any template can be set as the examination text, since the template chart is the marking scheme.
Before you decide
Drawing their own families in class
Many courses set a family of origin genogram, and students are often asked to present it. It is worth separating the two. The drawing can be set as private work and the templates used for anything done in front of the class, so that no student has to show a diagnosis or a divorce to the room.
The famous families and their sources
The six famous templates are drawn from published genograms and from public sources named in each case note, and the note says where sources disagree on a date. They are history as recorded rather than clinical records, and they suit a class because every student can check the facts.
Files from other programs
A student who has drawn a family in GenoPro, Gramps or a family tree program can bring it across as a GEDCOM, GenoPro, Gramps, Mermaid or spreadsheet file, and the editor lists anything the file did not carry. Emotional lines are not in those formats and are drawn afterwards.
Accounts for a whole class
Each student works without an account or creates a free one of their own. A teacher who keeps a chart for each student in a class of more than five uses Pro at $12 a month or $99 a year, which holds fifty.
Open a template and read its case note, or paste a case note and review the draft. Every template opens without an account.
Open the editor