What are fingerprints?

Learning Objectives

 
  • Be able to categorize a given fingerprint into one of three basic categories
  • Identify common fingerprint patterns from samples
  • Explain the process of fingerprint collection

Download the outline for this lesson before you start so you can take notes.

Overview - Bill Nye the science guy

Fingerprint Basics

why study fingerprints?

Play this game - http://www.wonderville.ca/v1/activities/mystery/mysteryactivity.html - and see how good you are at finding fingerprint matches!

History of forensic fingerprints

More about fingerprints

Just for fun!

Read Mark Twain's "Life on the Mississippi" or "Pudd'nhead Wilson", or Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Norwood Builder" (it's part of "The Return of Sherlock Holmes") online through Project Gutenberg.

Now back to our regularly scheduled lesson:

Before you do anything else, download and review this fingerprint basics card.

Then, take this short fingerprint quiz to review what you've just learned. You will not be graded on this quiz, you will receive either a 0 (for not taking the quiz at all) or 100 (for taking the quiz and submitting the results). When you finish the quiz, please take a screen capture of the final screen and upload it to the assignment area of Moodle.

You are required to take this quiz, but remember that the grade you get does not count toward your grade - it is, however, an indication for you whether or not you should review the lesson.

Activities

Before you start the next video, please download this fingerprint worksheet to your computer. Also, make sure to look at the grading rubric for the assignments you will submit, so you can review your work before handing it in.

It can be fun to collect fingerprints! Watch the video to find out how to do it.