The Body in the Woods: A Point Last Seen Mystery

Use this activity to engage all types of learners, while requiring that they refer to and incorporate details from the text over the course of the activity.

“The Body in the Woods Evidence Board”

In this activity, students will demonstrate their ability to follow Ruby’s inferences and deductions as the plot unfolds by creating an “evidence board” presentation that gradually reveals the solution to the mystery.

Ruby is the most analytical and observant team member. What does she observe, what inferences does she make, and how does she gradually deduce the solution to the mystery? In this activity, you will create a presentation that uses an “evidence board” format to follow Ruby’s thought process as she considers who is responsible for the murders.

Do Some Background Research

• What is an evidence board? Look at some online examples to make sure you understand what one looks like.
• Which presentation maker will work best to create your evidence board? Explore online options or physical materials.

Gather Your Clues

• Make a list of the clues that Ruby observes or that others share with her, in the order that Ruby obtains them.
• Make notes about what inferences she draws and the deductions she makes. Be sure to also note when her ideas change and why they change.

Create Your Evidence Board

• Add the clues to the evidence board in the order that Ruby observes them. Use images that you find online to represent each clue—photographs, drawings, documents, and other applicable images. Be sure to cite their sources at the end of your presentation.
• Show relationships among the clues by visually connecting them with red lines to represent the string used on evidence walls. Add these connecting lines in the order that Ruby connects them.
• Add “sticky notes” containing text explaining Ruby’s inferences and deductions, in the order in which she makes these.
• Whichever presentation maker you choose, use its particular design capabilities to show how Ruby’s thinking develops and changes over time. The elements on your evidence board should not appear all at once but should appear over time and could move from place to place, mimicking the changes in Ruby’s thinking as she puts her ideas together.

Teaching Suggestion: After students complete their presentations, you may wish to give them time to present their work in class or to a small group or offer them an online space to post their presentations for others to see. You might elicit peer feedback, such as answering a brief set of questions about a few peers’ presentations. If your students are ready for an additional challenge, you might also ask them to discuss or write about how Alexis’s perspective differs from Ruby’s—at which points in these presentations would Alexis disagree with Ruby’s thoughts about the case, and why would she disagree?

Differentiation Suggestion: English learners, students with dyslexia, and those with attentional and executive function differences may struggle to gather together the clues, inferences, and deductions needed to create their evidence boards. These students may benefit from a chart or list with pertinent chapters identified for guidance. Students who have difficulty with abstract ideas and those with executive function issues may not immediately understand how to show relationships among ideas in this particular format. You might offer these students some coaching on various ways to position and connect elements to show their relationships.

Paired Text Extension:

This activity can also be completed with April Henry’s Blood Will Tell: A Point Last Seen Mystery or with Maureen Johnson’s The Box in the Woods.

Teaching Suggestion: Should you choose to use this activity with one of the Paired Texts, you will need to change the character whose perspective you are asking students to focus on.