Mystery Festival

Melissa Lindsey & Kristen Lugar

Interview Questions and Responses

 Interview 1

I interviewed a 2^nd grade student who is my next door neighbor and I began this interview by having the student read through the GEMS guide so she could familiarize herself with what is was covering before I asked my questions. 

Tell me in own words what a mystery is?

 I think the word mystery means to solve something.

Tell me how would you use clues to solve a mystery?

I would first find all the clues that help me solve the problem I see, then I would use those clues and try to piece them together to try to find out what happened.

 Do you think that having the skill of drawing conclusions is important in solving a mystery and if so why.

Yes I think having the skill of coming up with my own conclusions is an important part of being able to solve a mystery because it lets me put all the clues and information together in my head so I can figure out what happened.

 Tell me in your own words what DNA testing is?

 I think it is finding blood or getting blood from so place or someone takes that blood and runs many tests on that blood to see if it is different or the same.

The responses this student gave were accurate in the developmental stages for her age. She had yet to develop complex explanations for the questions asked but instead used simple explanations that were familiar to what she believed were they correct response. She was extremely interested in actually completing the mystery from the GEMS guide to see who actually took Mr. Bear.

Interview 2

Age 8/2^nd grade/male

Q:   What is a mystery?

A:  I think a mystery is like Clue, the game.

Q:  Oh, I see.  Can you tell me more?

A:  Like you have to solve the puzzle, like the mystery.

Q:  What does solving a mystery mean?

A:   You have to find out who the bad guy is, and it’s a mystery because you don’t know who it is.

Q:  How can we figure out what happened?

A:  You can look for clues, or you know, ask people questions.  I think it is like when someone robs a bank or hurts someone and they don’t know who it is.

Q: Oh, I see.  Who solves the mysteries?

A:  The police, like the detective guy, and you can ask people that saw what happened.

Q:  Can you give me an example or story about a mystery, maybe from a book or movie?

A:  One time my mom lost her ring, and we couldn’t find it and we didn’t know what happened.  So my dad called it a mystery, but we found it at the restaurant we ate at.

Q:  How did you figure out the mystery of the lost ring?

A:  She called the restaurant where we ate because she had it on there, and they had it.

Q:  Oh, well I’m glad she found it.  Do you like mysteries?

A:  yeah, only when they are games or have a happy ending.  Not real ones like when they’re scary.

Q:  Can you draw me a picture of your mystery story?

A:  yeah (picked up a pencil and paused for a few seconds)..Umm..I don’t know what to draw.  I changed my mind.  I don’t want to.

Analysis:

I think this student has a good basic understanding of the concept of mysteries.  He understands that mysteries have to be solved and he knew vocabulary (detectives, clues) for the topic.  I found it interesting that he referred to a mystery as solving a puzzle.  He realizes that a mystery involves putting the pieces or clues together.  I thought it was interesting that he first referred to mysteries using the word “bad guys”, but in his story about the ring there was no “bad guy”.  I think with some introduction and further teaching, this student will be able to understand concepts such as evidence, inference, and investigation.