Author: Devin Toombs

Author: Devin Toombs

Lesson Title: The Art of Eyewitness Identificaion

Suggested Grade Level:

10

Estimated Lesson Time:

30 minutes

Abstract:

Students will learn about the role of forensic art in eyewitness identification and the different forms of forensic art. They will attempt to create a facial composite on a smartphone based on their memory and the class will attempt to identify it

Student Prior Knowledge:

Students should have some background knowledge on eyewitness identification and the difficulties in making accurate identifications.

Standards:

SS.912.C.2.4: Evaluate, take, and defend positions on issues that cause the government to balance the interests of individuals with the public good.

Goals:

Students will demonstrate the difficulty in creating facial composites by creating their own facial composite of a familiar face, based off of memory. They will display their composite through a googledocs presentation, to illustrate the difficulty in creating faces just based on memory. Understanding this component of forensic science will help them to understand the subjectiveness of facial composites and will help them to evaluate the validity of eyewitness identification and how reliable it is in a trial.

Learning Objectives or “I can statements”:

●I can demonstrate what a facial composite is

●I can identify the different forms of forensic art

●I can describe the role of eyewitness identification and facial composites in the criminal justice process

●I can evaluate the issues that arise in the validity and reliability in forensic art

Task- Create a Facial Composite

Using an the SmartPhone app “iMadeFace”, students will createa facial composite of a celebrity which will be uploaded to a google document for the class to identify

Resources:
Procedures:
1. Students will respond to poll everywhere survey question for background knowledge (3 minutes) Question: What is the most common element in wrongful convictions?

false confession

police misconduct

eyewitness misidentification

questionable forensic evidence

2. Teacher leads a lecture on the different forms of forensic art (10 minutes)

3. Teacher leads discussion on benefits and drawbacks of forensic art (2 minutes)

4. Students will create a facial composite of a chosen celebrity using the app iMadeFace on their smartphones. Students will upload their photo to a class google document presentation. (10 minutes) (adpotion: students are told of the technology to use, and how to use it and what to create with it)

5. The class will then view the presentation of facial composites and try to identify the celebrity that was recreated (5 minutes)

(active: interacting with environment to create a facial composite. authentic: creating facial composites is used to identify missing and wanted people in the real world)

Assessment: Students will be assessed based on participation in discussion and poll and then based on their uploading of a facial composite to the classroom google doc.