165 Questions to Ask Your Grandparents

We read the lists that rank for this search before writing ours. Several are one long run of questions with no advice on how to ask them, and almost none link to the people who do this for a living. Yet the method is free and public. StoryCorps has recorded conversations with more than 750,000 people since 2003. The Library of Congress runs the Veterans History Project. The Smithsonian, Baylor University and the Oral History Association all publish interview guides. None of the lists we read has a set of questions for a grandparent with memory loss, and only one gives the grandparent a single question to ask back.

So this list does three things differently. The method section follows those institutions and links to each one. The research section says plainly what the studies found and what they did not. And there are separate sets for grandma, grandpa, young kids, memory loss and the grandparent's turn to ask.

What should you ask your grandparents first?

Start with something easy and concrete, then follow the story wherever it goes. The Smithsonian's folklife interviewing guide opens with simple biographical questions such as where the person was born and grew up, and StoryCorps suggests writing only five to ten starter questions, because one sitting cannot cover a whole life. These ten work for a first conversation:

• Where did you live when you were small, and what did the house look like?
• Who lived there with you?
• What is the first thing you can remember?
• What did you do on a normal Saturday when you were ten?
• What did your mother or father do for work?
• Who was your best friend growing up, and what did you two get up to?
• What was your favorite meal as a kid, and who made it?
• What is one thing kids do now that would have been unthinkable when you were young?
• How did you meet Grandma (or Grandpa)?
• What were my mom or dad like when they were little?

The last two both appear on StoryCorps' own list of questions for grandparents, and they are the ones only a grandparent can answer.

How do oral historians run an interview?

They plan a few questions, then listen more than they talk. The Oral History Association asks interviewers to use open-ended questions with follow-ups that ask for clarification, detail and reflection, and to agree the rough length up front. Baylor University's Institute for Oral History adds four habits: ask one question at a time, start with "Tell me about...", avoid leading questions, and use the "silent question", which means staying quiet and waiting after an answer. Baylor also recommends interviewing one person at a time, because a second person in the room can answer for the narrator or take over, so interview grandma and grandpa separately. StoryCorps' conversation tips say to ask for sensory details and to keep "And then what happened?" ready. The Smithsonian guide says to bring old photographs, letters, scrapbooks and heirlooms, because they help stimulate memories and trigger stories.

How long should a grandparent interview be?

About an hour, and stop sooner if they tire. The guides disagree on the exact figure:

Baylor sets its average with the narrator's age and stamina in mind, and the Smithsonian's answer to tiredness is a second session, not a longer first one.

Follow-up prompts to keep handy

Most of the good material comes from the second question, not the first. These follow-ups echo the prompts in the StoryCorps, Smithsonian and Baylor guides:

• Tell me more about that.
• Can you give me an example?
• How did that happen?
• What did it look like? What did it smell like?
• Who else was there?
• How did you feel about it then? And now?
• And then what happened?
• Why do you think that stuck with you?

Densho, the archive of Japanese American incarceration histories, adds one warning: do not put a feeling in the narrator's mouth. Its interview guide suggests "What was it like when..." over "You must have been thrilled...".

Why do these conversations matter?

They give both generations something, though the research is more modest than the headlines that repeat it.

What does the research say about grandchildren?

The best-known evidence comes from Emory University. Psychologists Marshall Duke and Robyn Fivush built the "Do You Know?" scale, 20 yes-or-no questions such as whether a child knows how their parents met or where their grandparents grew up. In a 2008 study of 40 families, children who knew more family history had higher self-esteem, lower anxiety and fewer behavior problems. A 2010 follow-up with 66 teenagers linked it to self-worth and a clearer sense of identity.

Two cautions travel with those findings. The data are correlational, so they show that the two go together, not that one causes the other. And the authors say plainly that drilling children on family facts would not work. In their reading, the score is a marker of a family that tells stories at dinners and holidays, and the telling is the part that matters.

What do these conversations do for grandparents?

Psychiatrist Robert Butler proposed in 1963 that older people naturally go through a "life review", looking back over their lives. A 2012 meta-analysis of 128 studies found structured reminiscence programs brought moderate gains in ego-integrity and depressive symptoms, though its authors warn the effects are low when the aim is well-being rather than treatment. A Boston College study of grandparents and adult grandchildren found that emotional closeness went with fewer depressive symptoms in both generations. More frequent contact went the other way, with slightly more symptoms, not fewer. Closeness is what counted, not the number of calls.

There is also simply a lot of family memory out there to ask about. AARP's 2026 study puts the number of US grandparents at about 65 million, and in its 2018 survey about half saw themselves as the source of their family's roots and 40% as its storyteller.

Questions about their childhood

Childhood is the easiest place to start, because the memories are old and the stakes are low. Ask about places and objects before feelings.

• What town or neighborhood did you grow up in, and how has it changed?
• Draw me a map of the house you grew up in. Which room was yours?
• What could you see from your bedroom window?
• What chores did you have, and which did you hate?
• What games did you play outside, and what were the rules?
• What toy did you want and never get?
• What did you get in trouble for?
• What did your school look like, and how did you get there?
• Who was your favorite teacher, and why?
• What did a doctor's visit or a trip to the dentist look like back then?
• What did your family do on hot summer nights?
• What was the best birthday you had as a kid?

Questions about their parents and grandparents

This is the family history only they can give you, often about people you never met. Write down every name and place they mention, even if they are unsure of the spelling.

• What were your parents' full names, and where were they born?
• How did your parents meet?
• What was your mother like when she laughed? When she was angry?
• What was your father like at the end of a work day?
• Which of your parents were you closer to growing up?
• Did you know your own grandparents? What do you remember about them?
• Where did our family come from before that, and why did they leave?
• Which languages did people speak at home?
• What sayings did your parents repeat that you still hear in your head?
• Is there a relative everyone talked about but nobody explained?

Questions about growing up and their teen years

Teen years carry the first jobs, first freedoms and first music, which makes them easy to talk about and fun to hear.

• What did you and your friends do on a Friday night?
• What music did you listen to, and what did your parents think of it?
• What was your first job, and what did it pay?
• When did you first feel like an adult?
• What did you want to be when you grew up?
• What was the most rebellious thing you did?
• How did you learn to drive?
• What did a teenager have to ask permission for back then?
• Who was the person you most wanted to be like?
• What did you think the year 2000 would look like?

Questions about love and marriage

Ask these gently, and let them decide how much to share. Not every grandparent married, and some had more than one great love.

• How did you meet the person you married (or the love of your life)?
• What did you notice about them first?
• What was your first date?
• How did the proposal happen, and who asked whom?
• What do you remember about your wedding day?
• What did you argue about in the first year?
• What did you learn about making a marriage work?
• What is a small thing they did that you still miss or still love?
• What was your first home together like?
• What advice would you give me about choosing a partner?

Questions about work and money

Work fills most of an adult life and often gets skipped. These questions also turn up prices and habits that surprise grandkids.

• What jobs have you had, from the first to the last?
• Which job did you love, and which did you put up with?
• What did a loaf of bread, a movie ticket and a gallon of gas cost when you started work?
• What was the first big thing you saved up for?
• Who taught you how to handle money?
• Did you ever take a big risk at work? How did it turn out?
• What skill did you have that nobody has anymore?
• What did you do with your first paycheck?
• What was the hardest stretch financially, and how did you get through it?
• What would you tell me about choosing work?

Questions about the history they lived through

Your grandparents remember events you only read about. Ask where they were, not what they thought, and the opinions will come anyway.

• What news event do you remember hearing about as a child?
• Where were you when you heard the biggest news of your life?
• What invention changed your daily life the most?
• When did your family get its first television, phone or car?
• How did a war, a strike or a hard economy touch our family?
• What did people around you argue about in those years?
• Did you ever take part in a protest, a campaign or a vote that mattered to you?
• What do people get wrong now about the time you grew up in?

If your grandparents moved to the US from another country, the Smithsonian guide includes a set of questions for immigrants about why they left and what they brought. These four follow it:

• Why did you leave, and who made the decision?
• What did you bring with you, and what did you have to leave behind?
• What was the journey like?
• What surprised you most about this country when you arrived?

Questions about traditions, food and heirlooms

Food and objects are the stories families pass down without trying. Ask with the recipe card or the object in front of you.

• What did your family eat on holidays, and who cooked it?
• Which recipe should I learn from you before anyone else?
• What traditions did you keep from your own childhood, and which did you drop?
• What was Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah or Eid like in your house?
• Is there an object in this house with a story behind it?
• Who gave you that ring, watch or piece of furniture?
• What songs did people sing at family gatherings?
• What did your family do when someone was born, married or died?
• Which family tradition do you hope I keep?
• What did you make with your hands, and who taught you?

Questions about my parent as a child

Your grandparent is the only other adult who watched your parent grow up, which makes these the questions nobody else can answer.

• What was my mom or dad like as a baby?
• What did they get in trouble for?
• What did they want to be when they grew up?
• What were they afraid of as a kid?
• What was the hardest thing about raising them?
• When were you proudest of them?
• What do they do now that reminds you of themselves at my age?
• What is a story about them they would rather I did not hear?

Questions about hard times

Hard memories belong in the record too, but only if your grandparent wants them there. The Oral History Association's principles say a narrator can decline any question, take a break or end the interview at any time. The Veterans History Project suggests asking before the interview which topics they want to include or avoid. Say out loud that "pass" is a fine answer.

• What was the hardest year of your life?
• Who helped you get through it?
• What did you lose that you still think about?
• Is there a decision you would make differently?
• What did a hard time teach you that a good time could not?
• How did our family come back together after a falling out?

Questions about values and looking back

These work best near the end of a session, when they have warmed up. StoryCorps' tips suggest saving reflective questions for the last few minutes.

• What are you most proud of?
• What do you believe now that you did not believe at my age?
• What was the happiest time of your life?
• What is one thing you hope never changes in our family?
• What do you want people to remember about you?
• What advice would you give your twenty-year-old self?
• What do you hope for me?
• Is there anything you have never been asked that you wish someone would ask?

Questions to ask your grandma

These sit alongside the topic lists above. They lean into the parts of a grandmother's life that grandkids tend to know least about.

• What were girls expected to do, or not do, when you were growing up?
• What was your own mother like as a mother?
• What did you wear on special occasions as a teenager?
• What did you want for your life at twenty, and how close did it come?
• What was the hardest part of being a young mother?
• What did nobody tell you about raising kids?
• Which of your mother's recipes do you still make from memory?
• What friendship has lasted the longest in your life?
• What were you good at that you never got credit for?
• What do you want your granddaughters and grandsons to know about being brave?

If you are still working out what to call her, our guide to grandma and grandpa names covers 70 languages.

Questions to ask your grandpa

If he is slow to warm up, start with something he did or made: a job, a car, a place he built or fixed.

• What was your father like, and what did he teach you?
• What was the first car you owned, and what happened to it?
• What did you build, fix or make with your hands?
• What was your hardest day at work?
• Who was the best boss you ever had?
• What did you and your friends do for fun when you had no money?
• How did you court Grandma (or the person you married)?
• What did you worry about when you became a father?
• What do you know how to do that I should learn?
• When did you last cry, and why?

If your grandfather (or grandmother) served in the military, the Library of Congress Veterans History Project accepts recorded interviews for its permanent collection. Its field kit says the interviewer must be 15 or older and the recording at least 30 minutes. Its guidance puts the veteran's comfort first, and it says pausing or stopping is fine.

What questions can kids ask their grandparents?

Kids get the best answers with short questions about things they can picture. We found no research on the right age to start. The rules that exist come from programs: StoryCorps' Great Listen, which invites families to record an elder over the holidays, is open to ages 13 and up (under-18s need a parent's consent to register), and the Veterans History Project needs an interviewer of 15 or older. A younger child can still ask while a parent holds the phone. For a school project, the Library of Congress publishes a classroom unit, Conversations with Elders, that models the whole interview.

For little kids (a grown-up records):

• What was your favorite toy?
• Did you have a pet? What was its name?
• What did you eat for breakfast when you were little?
• What was your favorite game?
• Were you ever scared of the dark?
• Did you have a teddy or a blanket you took everywhere?

For school-age kids:

• What was school like when you were my age?
• What is the naughtiest thing you ever did?
• What did kids do before video games?
• Who was your best friend, and what did you do together?
• What did you do after school?
• What is the best present you ever got?
• What is something you can do that I would be surprised by?

For teens:

• What did you and your parents fight about when you were my age?
• What was your first heartbreak like?
• What did you think the future would be like?
• What is a mistake you are glad you made?
• What would you tell me to stop worrying about?
• What do you think my generation gets right?

How do you talk with a grandparent who has memory loss?

Lean on recognition instead of recall, and never correct them. In the early stage of Alzheimer's, the Alzheimer's Association says people can usually still hold meaningful conversations, and it asks that you speak to them directly, not to their caregiver. In the middle stage it suggests one question at a time, often yes-or-no, and listening for the meaning behind an answer instead of arguing with the facts. The National Institute on Aging suggests offering a choice in place of an open question. Its caregiving guide also says to avoid "Don't you remember?" and to bring a photo album or music.

Keep expectations modest: a 2018 Cochrane review found reminiscence therapy's effects in dementia were small and inconsistent, with no evidence of harm to the person with dementia. The aim is a good afternoon together, not a complete record.

These prompts follow that advice:

• Who is this in the photo? (Point to one person.)
• Was this your house, or your sister's?
• Do you like this song?
• Did you like summer or winter better?
• Did you make this, or did someone give it to you?
• What does this smell remind you of? (Bring coffee, bread or a flower.)
• Were you a good dancer?
• Tell me about this picture.

If an answer is wrong, let it stand. The Alzheimer's Association's advice is to "let it be".

What can grandparents ask their grandkids?

The interview runs both ways. Only one of the lists we read gave the grandparent a turn, and then just one question. These work at the table, on the phone or in a card.

• What is the best thing that happened to you this week?
• What are you really good at that grown-ups do not notice?
• Who is the funniest person in your class, and why?
• If you could change one rule at home, what would it be?
• What are you looking forward to?
• What is something you are worried about?
• What do you want to learn how to do?
• What is a song you cannot stop listening to?
• What would you want to know about me at your age?
• If you ran the world for a day, what would you do first?
• What do you think I was like as a kid?
• What do you want to remember about today?

AARP's 2026 study found 76% of grandparents use texts, video calls or group chats as a main way to stay in touch, so these work just as well on a video call as at the kitchen table.

How do you record and save the interview?

Use the phone you already have, and copy the file the same day. The free StoryCorps app records on a phone, and StoryCorps Connect records over video for a grandparent who lives far away. Interviews you publish to the StoryCorps online archive are also preserved at the Library of Congress's American Folklife Center. With the app, an interview you do not publish stays only on your phone, so back it up. StoryCorps Connect interviews are saved to the online archive.

Before the first question, say the date, both your names and a general location (not a street address), which the Oral History Association and the Veterans History Project both ask for. The Veterans History Project also asks you to say your relationship. The Smithsonian guide says to explain what will happen to the recording, honor any limits your grandparent sets, and send a thank-you with a copy afterwards. Then follow the archivists' rule that Baylor's manual quotes, LOCKSS: Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe. Move the original to a computer and keep it in at least four places, such as two external drives and two cloud services, as Baylor advises.

Frequently asked questions

For more words to put in the card that goes with it, see our family quotes and who said them or our personalized gifts for grandparents.