Family History by the Numbers: Generations & Ancestor Counts, Pedigree Numbering, Cousin Relationships, Date Estimates and Research Trackers

What you'll build

What you will be able to do

Each lab ends with a concrete result that you build yourself and the checker confirms, cell by cell.

• Count Talia's ancestors in each of ten generations with POWER, add them up, estimate when each generation was born and find how far back a generation passes 1,000 people.
• Compare the theoretical number of ancestors with the unique people Talia has found, count the repeated places and calculate the collapse share per generation and for the whole tree.
• Use an ancestor numbering scheme to find each person's father and child number, work out the generation of any number with LOG and look up a person's parents by number.
• Work out the cousin degree and the «removed» steps for eight pairs of relatives, fill a relationship chart with mixed references and count the cousin pairs.
• Turn five stated ages into birth-year ranges, find the overlap of the four consistent records with MAX and MIN and see why one record does not fit.
• Check eight parent–child entries: the parent's age at the child's birth, children recorded after a parent's death, a combined IFS flag and the number of entries to re-check.
• Follow one family line through nine residence entries: the straight-line distance of each step, the places per generation, the number of real moves and the total distance moved.
• Score how complete each of Talia's 15 ancestors is, total the open questions and completeness per generation with COUNTIFS and SUMIF and chart where the research should go next.