Another Mystery Unit

What do Sherlock Holmes and food have in common? They both create mysteries!  Let me explain...Two years ago the boys and I did a mystery unit.  We read The Westing Game, did some fun activities, and finished off with a mystery meal.  It was such a hit that I have decided that we are going to do a shortened mystery unit.  Our favorite activities were the read aloud and the mystery meal. I have been trying to come up with a list of books/stories we could read that are mysteries and/or involve crimes.  This is what I am looking at as far as read alouds go.

The Ransom of Red Chief
The Complete Father Brown Stories

and if there is time...

The Case of the Missing Marquess: An Enola Holmes Mystery

I am working on a new mystery meal.  To see what a mystery meal consists of and how we did ours, click here. I would love to hear if you have any ideas!

Our Mystery Meal is Served!

I served the boys their mystery meal today to go along with the mystery/detective unit. If you want to see what else we have done in our unit see here. This is probably the most enjoyable activity we have done all school year!

Here's our menu:

napkin-crumb catcher

spoon-The Big Dipper

fork-Neptune's Trident

knife-the pride of Switzerland (like a Swiss Army knife, get it?)

Coke-bubbly brownie

Caesar salad-Roman mix-up

croutons-little blocks

dressing-pants and shirt

cucumber slices-lily pads

cheese Bagel Bites-dairy donuts

pepperoni Bagel Bites-dotted donuts

ice cream sandwich-arctic bovine burger

I set the boys up in their bedroom with a small table and chairs. That way I could make all my preparations in the kitchen without them seeing. They were told that they had to remain in the bedroom for the whole activity. I then handed them menus in which they picked the items they wanted for their three courses. Since they had no idea what most of the names meant they randomly chose numbers (of the items) to go in their courses. If you are interested in having a copy of the menu please leave me a comment with your e-mail address and I will get it to you. Here they are filling out their menus...

Here is some of the food served...lily pads, bubbly brownie, pants and shirt, little blocks and Roman mix-up.The first course: Zach was served little blocks, dotted donuts, a crumb catcher, and a big dipper. Noah was served little blocks, Roman mix-up, Neptune's trident and the Arctic bovine burger.Second course: Zach was served Roman mix-up, Neptune's trident, The pride of Switzerland, and bubbly Brownie. Noah received bubbly brownie, a big dipper, the price of Switzerland, and a crumb catcher.Third course: Zach received lily pads, pants and shirt, dairy donuts, and an arctic bovine burger. Noah was served dotted donuts, dairy donuts, lily pads and pants and shirt.The boys loved this activity so much that they want to come up with a menu to do for their dad!

More Mystery Fun!!

Julie, a fellow Five in a Row and Homeschool Share mom, is also doing a mystery unit with her kids. Check out her site, Our Faith-Filled Days, for some great ideas!

Detective Science-Fingerprinting

Today we started some of the science experiments in Detective Science. See here for more information on Detective Science. I showed the boys how to take each other's fingerprints. They then classified their fingerprints into arches, loops, and whirls. We also read Psalms 139 and focused on the verse about how we are fearfully and wonderfully made and connected that to our uniqueness and how nobody shares our fingerprints. We are each created by God and have things that are special about us!

Detective Science

Here is another great book that I have decided to use for our Mystery/Detective unit. These are science experiments based on solving a crime or mystery. We won't do all of them, but I will pick and choose a few that I know the boys will like. Here are some of the topics covered in the book: fingerprints, cloth and paper fibers, blood identification, ink identification, teeth impressions, DNA testing, handwriting analysis.

Check out my other posts about our mystery/detective unit.

More Great Mystery/History Books

Julie from Our Faith-Filled Days reminded me of these great mystery books about events in history. Check them out!

Mystery Meal Menu

See my previous post below about our mystery/detective unit that we will be doing. Here is the menu that I will do for the boys for our meal. Not the most nutritious meal and not stuff we would normally eat, but this is for fun! Some of the names the kids probably won't get (like "bovine"), but it will be an opportunity to increase their vocabulary and knowledge.

napkin-crumb catcher
spoon-The Big Dipper
fork-that thing in the road or I might call it "Neptune's Trident
knife-the pride of Switzerland (like a Swiss Army knife, get it?)
Coke-bubbly brownie
Caesar salad-Roman mix-up
croutons-little blocks
dressing-pants and shirt
cucumber slices-lily pads
cheese Bagel Bites-dairy donuts
pepperoni Bagel Bites-dotted donuts
icecream sandwich-arctic bovine burger

Mystery/Detective Unit Study

We are about finished with our Beyond Five in a Row unit on Helen Keller. So I asked the boys what they were interested in studying. Noah said, "Animals", which is what we are doing for science next year. Zach said he wanted to study mysteries or detectives. So I decided that for the rest of the school year we would do a unit on mysteries! This is going to be so much fun!
Here is what I have in store for the boys. First of all, our read aloud is going to be The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin. Here is a brief summary from Wikipedia:
Sixteen individuals, of all ages, races, and socioeconomic classes, most of whom live or work in the Sunset Towers apartment building, are summoned to the reading of the will of wealthy industrialist Samuel W. Westing. The will is in the form of a puzzle, dividing up the sixteen heirs into eight pairs, giving each pair a unique set of clues, and challenging the heirs to solve the mystery of which of the sixteen of them killed Westing; whoever solves the mystery will inherit Westing's $200,000,000 fortune. Friendships between the sixteen heirs are made, broken, and mended as each pair attempts to pursue the solution in their own way. To add to the mayhem, there are occasional bombs set by an unidentified heir. As the participants' wild accusations fly, only one heir keeps a cool head and solves the puzzle.
I have heard a lot of great things about this book. I can't wait to read it. We will keep a detective's log to try to figure out who committed the crime.We are also going to read about some mysteries in history using a book from National Geographic (see below). I don't think we will read all of them. My goal is to focus on Stonehenge, El Dorado, the lost colony of Roanoke, and maybe the shooting of JFK.

Another fun book that we are going to use is Art Fraud Detective by Anna Nilsen. In this book you have to look at original paintings by great artist like Van Gogh and then examine the paintings in the fictional art museum in the book to see if you can spot the forged paintings. I have been looking through this book and love it! It gets kids to really look at great art and the details of famous paintings. There are two other books in the series, The Great Art Scandal and Art Auction Mystery. I am going to try to get my hands on those if I can. One of the fun activities we are going to do is a mystery meal! I am really excited about this! Have you ever done a mystery meal? Basically you are given a menu and all the foods are given a different name. The new name has clues to what the items are. You are then required to write down what items you want for each course (we will probably do three courses). The items are then served to you according to your choices that you wrote down. Because you really don't know what all the items are you may come up with some interesting courses! For example, you may get dessert first. You may not have any utensils to eat with (the utensils are on the menu too.). It should be fun. Check back later...I will be posting our mystery meal menu! But, shhhh, don't tell the kids!