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7th Grade: Murder Mystery!
Embarassed suspects holding incriminating evidence
The unit was created in collaboration with a science teacher and co-teacher in an ICT classroom. The students were presented with a scenario: Their beloved assistant principal was murdered (not really), and the murderer was walking among them! It was up to the class to narrow down the list of suspects and make an inference as to the identity of the murderer. Students studied the definition of evidence and what it meant to truly prove something vs. proving that something is plausible. Using the evidence they gathered through a series of science and research classes, they chose the most likely culprit and wrote an essay to defend their claims.
The unit was designed for 7th grade English Language Learners. Labs and lessons included the nature of evidence, sand analysis, fingerprint analysis, biomes/photograph analysis, and a math-based "hacking" lab. Other than assistance with the overall design of the unit, my contribution included a lesson on biomes and finding textual evidence to support a claim. Lesson Plan:
Sample photographs of the suspects in different biomes:
Biome Information Handout/Student Work (From the Lesson):
Student Work:
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