A suspicious briefcase appears in the school grounds with a complex coded message attached. Then elsewhere, a gang of robbers breaks into the school and runs off with a stash of valuable loot. Meanwhile, the discovery of a gruesome murder leaves everyone looking over their shoulders. And if that isn’t enough drama for one day, someone gets kidnapped but the kidnapper has left only a few clues behind.

On the surface, the theme of the day is enticing – everyone loves a good detective drama. But that’s really just a tongue-in-cheek story line. The serious agenda of Crime Squad is really to explore transferable skills. Tackling tasks which demand a multitude of different thinking skills, students collaborate in teams to solve puzzles, decipher clues and make clever decisions.

As one of our modular courses, Crime Squad requires students to stay in teams and visit several stations over the course of the day. Our Course Leaders stay put whilst the students move around. Each module is designed to address a different set of skills. We may vary the activities or change the emphasis on particular skills depending on a school’s objectives.

A typical day may include:

• A formal yet energised introduction with everyone together. The schedule is communicated, expectations are set and the fires are lit.
• A Wiser Words code-cracking task which combines some lateral thinking and hands-on problem solving with logic and deduction
• A Wiser Words strategy game where students must combine creative thinking with meticulous planning, foresee obstacles and incorporate contingencies
• A Wiser Words investigation activity about inference, i.e. intelligent guesswork. From examining evidence and piecing clues together, students must estimate probabilities and make decisions as a team about how to move forward.
• A Wiser Words controlled communication game which evolves as a challenge in presentation and argument. Students must identify key points to communicate as a priority.
• Everyone back together for a reflection activity to explicitly identify learning points, reinforce ‘aha’ moments and commend achievements

All the tasks in Crime Squad fit our definition of a true team task – it’s impossible for one person to complete them on their own. Collaboration is not only better, it’s essential.

All tasks have a time limit which adds an element of working under pressure. This highlights the tension between the advantages of making quick decisions or spending time evaluating all options and listening to everyone’s ideas.  Equally, it raises questions about communication – when to be concise or assertive, when to give lengthy explanations and when to be silent?

Students gain a deeper understanding of all this through practice and experience but then after all the action, we encourage discussion to reflect and explicitly identify learning points. We would be disappointed if they didn’t complain of being mentally exhausted by the end of the day!

If there’s a fire in the chemistry lab, you need to shout and be to the point. If someone’s about to jump off the roof of a skyscraper, you need to be gentle and think of lots of positive things to say. What about in an academic debate, or in an interview, a meeting, an interrogation, or a courtroom?  … and of course it also depends on whether you’re the interviewer or the interviewee, the barrister, witness or defendant. How many times have you seen the phrase, “I have excellent communication skills” written on a UCAS form or CV? But what does that really mean?

The truth is that these terms such as ‘communication skills’, ‘problem solving’, ‘decision making’ and ‘team skills’, whilst being commonly thrown about, are actually highly complex themes that we will all be analysing, reevaluating and trying to master for the rest of our lives. Problem solving isn’t just one skill – it’s an umbrella term covering many skills and the problems to be solved also come in a wide variety of different shapes and sizes.

So whilst we would never suggest that students will master the art of problem solving or communication from this experience of one or two days, we do endeavour to highlight many of the skills involved and demonstrate how useful they are for academic success and life in general.

This course is ideal for whole year groups and is often delivered for new sixth formers to highlight active learning skills transferable to academic achievement. We can tailor all activities to meet the age, ability and needs of your students. So this course can work as well for students in year 7 as much as for sixth form.