4HOnline Record Book is still under development, using this service helps us to make the end product better for Iowa 4-H’ers now and in the future. Any questions about the program or suggestions to make it better for our 4-H Members and Families can be directed to Phil Heckman at

Open a web browser and type in: You will now see the Iowa 4-H Youth Development Log In Page.

  • Find the area for Iowa 4-H Youth development and Click “Sign in.”
  • A pop-up will appear. Enter your Family E-mail and log-in credentials just as you would for 4HOnline. Remember 4HOnline passwords are case sensitive. Your county office should be able to assist you if you are unsure of your 4HOnline log-in credentials

Forgot your password?

  • Mark "I forgot my Password."
  • Click "Send my Password." Do not close the internet window.
  • Go to your own email account and find the email sent to you from 4HOnline. It will have your temporary password. If you can’t find it in your Inbox, check Junk Mail. The sender will be “”
  • Return to 4H online.
  • This is your Family record Screen. It imports your basic contact information from your 4HOnline Family record as well as a list of 4-H Youth and their enrolled project areas.
  • If you add a new 4-H’er or add new project areas to existing 4-H Member records, clicking the “Sync with 4HOnline” button will update your Record Book account to reflect those changes.
  • Click on any Youth in your family to allow them to begin work on their online record.

You are now logged into an individual’s RecordBook profile. You can tell whose profile you are logged into by looking in the upper right hand corner of the screen. If you need to navigate to another family member, you can click the “Back to Family” link to select a different family member.

The RecordBook Timeline is the heart of the RecordBook Program. You can think of this area of Record Book as a timeline of your 4-H Experiences. As you have an experience in 4-H you can record that experience in a quick photo, note, or income/expense item. To log your first experience, click the “Log an Experience” button.

  • The first step to logging an experience would be to upload a photo of your experience.
  • Click the “Choose File” button and navigate to the folder and file that you wish to upload. Select the file in the open window and “Open” it.
  • The file name you selected will appear next to the “Choose File” button and then you can click the “Upload” button to upload it to your timeline.
  • If you don’t want to upload a photo, you can skip this step by selecting the “Skip this Step” link.
  • The next step is to fill in the details of this experience. Fill in a brief description of your experience (up to 250 characters.)
  • Use the calendar menu to indicate the date that this experience occurred. The default date is the current date.
  • If you incurred an expense or received any income related to this experience you can indicate this by putting in a negative number for an expense, or a positive number for an income.
  • Once you have completed all of the details of your experience, click the “Save Experience” button to add this experience to your timeline.
  • You have now added an experience to your Timeline. You can add additional experiences to the timeline using the “Log an Experience” button, or you can edit a timeline entry by clicking the small “RB” circle in in the lower Right hand corner of the experience.
  • Experiences in your timeline will appear in chronological order, newer experiences will appear near the top of your timeline, older experiences at the bottom.
  • Future updates to the program will allow you to add experiences to your timeline from a mobile friendly website or from an optional mobile app. Those features are still in development, but look for them to come soon.
  • Experiences in your timeline will help you to fill in the progress you make towards your Project goals throughout the year and throughout your whole 4-H Career. To begin, let’s start a Project Record. You can start a new project record either by clicking the “Begin a project record” button on this page or by clicking the “Project Records” link at the top of the screen.
  • This is your Project Records page. It has a list of all of the 4-H Projects that you are enrolled in within 4HOnline. You create a new project record by clicking the “Begin Project Record” Button. If you do not see the project that you would like to create a record for, you will need to log into your 4HOnline account and add that project to your enrollment profile. Once added, you can click the “Sync with 4HOnline” button found on your family screen to update your project record list.
  • Your project record is the place that will hold all of your experiences, goals, and profit/loss over all your years in 4-H. There isn’t much to see here yet, because you haven’t set your goals for the year. Once you have set your goals, they will appear in this area, along with any experiences you tie to those goals.
  • Let’s set up your first goal. Click the “Goals” Link at the top of the page.
  • Since you haven’t set any Goals yet you will see a screen like this one. Click “Set a Goal” button to set up your first Goal.
  • The first step to set a goal is to determine what action you want to take. There are good examples of the types of actions you might take included on this page.
  • The second step is to determine what you hope the result to be. The best results are ones that are specific and measurable. Remember that you shouldn’t set a goal that the result is not in your control.
  • The third step is to set a timeline of when you and to complete your goal. This might coincide with a specific event which you can indicate here in your goal as well.
  • Once you have created the three parts of your project goal for this year, select the project area that this goal coincides with, and click “Save this Goal.”
  • Once you have created a goal, you can set up an action plan to help you break your goal down into the different steps you might take before you reach your goal.
  • You can add as many action steps as you would like to your project goals.
  • When you are done setting Action Steps you can click the links at the top of the page to set another goal or to start assigning timeline items to specific goals in your project record.

Linking a 4-H Experience to a Project Record, Goal, or Action Step

  • To link an experience to a Project Record, Goal or Action Step return to your timeline by clicking the “Timeline” link at the top of the page.
  • Find the experience that you would like to add to your RecordBook and click the gray “RB” circle on that experience.
  • If you need to edit this experience to add more detail you can do so by clicking the “Edit” link, otherwise you can click the “Add to Record Book” Button to add it to your RecordBook Profile.
  • If this experience is an example of Citizenship, Communication, or Leadership related to the project area, you can check the box or boxes that apply. Then use the pull down menu to assign this experience to an action step, a project record, or just as an unattached experience. In most cases you will probably select an action step.
  • This experience is now a part of your project record. In the case of this example it appears as part of Food & Nutrition Learning related to the Goal of learning to bake a pie before the County Fair. If you need to edit or delete this connection you can use the on-screen options to do so.
  • Repeat these steps to assign all of your 4-H experiences to the goals that you have set for yourself.
  • If you return to your Goals, you will see that your experiences are now tied to your goals.
  • Check the boxes next to the action steps you have completed, to show that you have accomplished those parts of your goal. It will cross that step off your list, and will add to your overall goal progress.
  • By logging your experiences and tracking your progress towards your goals, you can keep a better record of your 4-H participation throughout the year!

4/27/16