Many EE users are familiar with ProGen Study Groups. Since 2008 this peer-led educational program has taken small groups of aspiring professional researchers through Professional Genealogy: Preparation, Practice & Standards, chapter by chapter, with mentors and coordinators guiding every group. Students read each chapter and prepare an assignment; then peers review each other’s work.
Jan Joyce, DBA, CG, CGL, AG, the program’s administrator, came to me with a request. She wanted permission to draw on chapters of Evidence Explained to build a citation game to help ProGen students. Then came the better half of the idea: it need not stop at ProGen; through EE it might reach the wider community.
We both loved where that was heading, and it is now ready to share.
Citations Coach opens with the four citation types, explaining what each is used for. Next it introduces the seven building blocks of a citation, one block at a time, including reasons why a block sometimes does not apply.
Then come the game plays. There is a sample First (Full) Reference Note for many of the record types that researchers use most: census, births and deaths, marriages, probate and wills, deeds, tax lists, newspapers, online family trees, and online memorials. Each one is taken apart layer by layer and block by block, so you can see how it was built.
At many levels, you build the citation yourself. Drag the chips into their slots. Decide which blocks are not needed. Find the flaw in a citation that looks perfectly respectable. Put the layers in order. You build it, you press the button, and the game tells you whether to take a bow.
No membership. No login. Citations Coach runs in any browser. Check it out in our new tab, Citations Coach, at the top right in the navigation bar.
HOW TO CITE
Elizabeth Shown Mills, “Citations Coach,” blog post, QuickTips: The Blog @ Evidence Explained (https://www.evidenceexplained.com/quicktips/ : posted 11 August 2026).