Students with a passion for history do not need textbooks or expert lectures to delve into the past.

“You really need to start with yourself when looking at your history,” New England Historic Genealogical Society assistant archivist Judith Lucey told more than 20 students last night at the Howard Thurman Center in the George Sherman Union.

“You’ll see how much information you have and where there are blanks, and [then] you’ll know where to go next,” said Lucey, who was joined by Newbury Street Press genealogist Christopher Child and NEHGS education and programs director Ryan Woods in teaching how to trace ancestral roots with census records, ship logs, border-crossing records and church.

“It’s like putting a puzzle together,” Lucey said. “I feel that these ancestors want me to find them.”

The presentation included previously traced examples such as the Coffee family, which has been traced back to the 1700s.

Woods, who has traced his family back to the 1600s, found nearly 400 relatives in his first year of searching, but he said, “There is always further to go.”

DNA tests are a technologically advanced option that can confirm or disprove origin, but it cannot provide specific family member data, Child said.

Some students who turned out for the event are only starting to explore their family trees.

“My ancestry doesn’t extend beyond Texas,” said College of Arts and Sciences senior Ericka Barnes. “I wanted to know how to get started finding more.”

“My last name is the reason I’m here,” CAS senior Feather Moy-Welsh said. “I’m Native American, but ‘Welsh’ sounds like it could be British, so I want to know what happened. It’s important to know where you came from.”

CAS senior Jacques Minoyan said that while some Americans aim to find famous relatives, he wanted to find a lost portion of his family tree.

Thurman Center Assistant Director Raul Fernandez said he set up the workshop to help students “have something by which [they] can learn about their backgrounds.”

Attendees received packets containing blank family trees, NEHG brochures and programs calendars. They were provided free day-passes to NEHGS, a Massachusetts genealogical records building on Newbury Street.

Additional packets will be available at the Thurman Center for those who could not attend, Fernandez said.

“We’ll have more services during the day to do one-on-one sessions with genealogists for anyone who is interested,” Fernandez said.