Whether you enter the world of Sherlock Holmes through TV shows, movies, or books, solving crimes and mysteries as Sherlock would involves plenty of interdisciplinary science, coordinating specialties like forensics, chemistry and computer science. The International Exhibition of Sherlock Holmes invites visitors to solve a murder mystery clue by clue using Sherlock's scientific methods. From shoes to fingerprints to blood spatter patterns, the science of Sherlock Holmes gets learners to look closely at the world around them, collect data, and analyze what they have found in different ways.
“Many of the techniques used by the Sherlock Holmes character all those years ago are now real techniques used today by forensic scientists and crime scene personnel,” says Catherine Knutson, director of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, which provided factual information about modern-day forensics for the exhibit.
Learners anywhere can become modern-day Sherlocks with Howtosmile.org activities. Test learners' powers of observation by having them investigate one piece of evidence at a time, or setting up a whole crime-solving scenario. At Howtosmile.org, get a clue with STEM activities about fingerprints, shoe prints, mystery powders, blood, crime scene investigation, DNA evidence, secret codes and more
In the Print Hints activity, learners explore how forensic investigators collect prints from a crime scene. Learners make hand impressions in damp sand and analyze the patterns they observe. They also set up mock crime scenes and analyze thumbprints and shoe prints.
In the Whodunit activity, learners use chemistry to identify a mystery powder and solve a "crime." They try to determine whether a character used baking soda or another "secret powder" to bake a cake, and "prove" whether the character is innocent or guilty.
In the activity Crime Scene: The Case of the Missing Computer Chip, learners must create a hypothesis from clues, then adjust that hypothesis as more information is revealed. The activity uses crime solving to introduce the nature of scientific inquiry, and show how science reveals unwitnessed events of the past by analyzing evidence.