Crime Lab Camp

Dear DaVinci Community,

We have had a great week at Crime Lab camp! Here is a look at a few of our favorite moments:

Monday

On Monday, the students created detective briefcases, which were made to hold all of their crafts for the week. After lunch, two detectives from the Portland Police department came to talk to the kids about being investigators. The detectives staged a crime scene and the children had to determine what was important evidence. Afterward, the children took the important evidence out to the police departments mobile crime truck that was parked in the elementary school parking lot. The kids got to use real crime scene tools to find and lift fingerprints off of the items in the staged crime scene.

The Briefcases!

The detectives have arrived!

Tuesday

We learned quite a bit about fingerprinting today. Each camper created his/her own print book, which was then decorated with fingerprints. Some students also chose to make lip prints with lipstick. They also closely examined their own fingerprints to discover whether they had a whorl, arch, or loop pattern. After this, we had a lesson on handwriting forensics. They learned about what characteristics detectives look at when studying handwriting. After this mini-lesson, the campers had to solve a crime by analyzing the handwriting of three suspects. They successfully identified the culprit! 

Figuring out our fingerprint patterns with Ms. Lydia

Print books! (look closely - can you see any lip prints?)

Campers study the handwriting of the three suspects

Wednesday

Today was disguise day! In the morning, we learned about voiceprints, and also learned several fun ways to disguise our voices. We then had a midday parade while wearing a creative assortment of hand-made costumes, face paint, and DaVinci dress-up clothes. 

At the end of the day, we had "Undercover Communication Stations."At one station, students learned how to craft messages using a reverse alphabet code. At a different station, students created unique ciphers by inventing their own alphabet. They then tried to write messages for their friends to decipher.  In the last station, campers got to experiment with invisible ink! They would write in lemon juice, and then watch the writing appear as it was exposed to a heat source.

The three stations: reverse alphabet, invisible ink, and ciphers!

Voiceprints

Thursday

In the morning, the students had a spyglass challenge. They were each given a paper towel roll and a toilet paper roll, and they were tasked with creating spyware of some kind. their inventions were unique and fabulous! Midday we had detective stations. These consisted of a blood splatter station, a shoeprint station, and a sketch artist station. The kids were stuck inside all day because of the rain, so we watched a movie at the end of the day. 

Spy glasses! 

Blood splatters and shoe prints

Friday

Light…Camera…Action! Get out some popcorn, everyone! On Friday of Crime Lab camp, the campers created a “DaVinci Solves Crime” movie. They had to use a lot of teamwork, patience, and resilience in order to put this movie together in only 6 hours. Bravo to all!