Tuesday, October 1. 2013

Today's schedule is C-AG-D-A-B

C Block Criminology 12 - Today we'll try to make sense of mass and serial murder. I'd like you to explain the types of serial and mass murderer along with the reasons why they commit these crimes. You can find the answers to this in the work of Jack Levin and James Alan Fox "Multiple Homicide: Patterns of Serial and Mass Murder". The summary of their work is on pages 209 and 210 of the textbook in the Criminological Enterprise section. For more info look at the work of John Douglas (former FBI profiler) on mindhunter.com (look in the article section and there is a great read entitled "So, you want to become a profiler..."). You will need to use this work to help with yesterday's blog entry. To better understand the people that commit heinous acts of murder, we'll also review what a "psychopath" is. Too often people throw the term psycho around without really understanding what it means so we'll look at Dr. Robert Hare's PCL-R (Psychopathy Checklist Revised). The diagnosis "Psychopath" is closely related to Antisocial Personality Disorder in the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 4th Edition).
In order to understand mass murder and motives we will dedicate some time this week to the murders at Columbine High School in Littleton Colorado a decade ago. We'll examine the Department of Justice (FBI) Critical Incident Response Group report "The School Shooter: A Threat Assessment Perspective" and the Columbine Review Commission report of Governor Bill Owens. In essence we'll look at the background of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold as well as the types of behavior, personality traits, and circumstances in the family, school, and community environment that should be regarded as warning signs of school shooters. After we finish our look at mass murder by focusing on Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold (for more see school shooters) we'll look at the leader of the "People's Temple"- the Reverend James Warren "Jim" Jones and the mass suicide of over 900 people in Jonestown Guyana.

D Block Law 12 - Today will be the last class for you to work on your human rights poster activity (due this Friday) and to prepare for tomorrow's unit final test. I will also answer some of your "Burning Questions" about Law that you've always wanted answered. These are the anonymous questions that you put in the Law Question Box and I'll take some time both today and next week to answer them.

A Block Law 9/10 - Today we will continue our look at criminal forensics by looking at how investigators estimate time of death, how fingerprints are "lifted" at a crime scene (including what AFIS is), what the "Four T's" are for marks at a scene, how fibres are used, and what ballistics is. After this, you may continue your work on the crime scene investigation project (Clue Us In). You'll have two more blocks of time in the library this week to finish up this crime scene reconstruction activity and the assignment is due next Friday, October 11th, 2013. For more on Forensic Science, check out SFU's "So you want to be a Forensic Scientist" webpage or check out the "All you ever wanted to know about Forensic Science in Canada but didn't know who to ask" booklet compiled by Dr. Gail Anderson and posted by the Canadian Society of Forensic Science

B Block Social Studies 10 -  Today we'll finish our look at the First Nations peoples (pre-contact) here in Canada. Yesterday we filled in a chart on the 5 Themes of Geography for the First Nations of Canada and we'll finish it today. After I'd like you to use all of the geographic work we've looked at, as well as the text, and try to answer the following:

"How has Geography shaped the culture of Canada?"

This is a big question and I really want you to try hard to think like a geographer here. Thinking like a geographer is thinking spatially in a systems manner. This involves looking for patterns, relationships and connections in order to comprehend large, complex self regulating systems. So what patterns, relationships and connections exist between people and places that help to shape Canada today?

When you are finished you should prepare for tomorrow's unit final test.