Part One: Warm Up
Discuss the following questions with your partner(s).
- Do you think you have “street smarts?” What do you think being “street smart” means?
- As you’ve seen in earlier lessons, there are many things you need to protect yourself from such things as bears and fire. However, safety doesn’t always mean protecting yourself physically. It can also mean keeping yourself safe from scams, identity theft, and online bullying. What can you do to protect yourself from these things? Do you have some habits or techniques that you use to keep yourself safe from non-violent crime?
Part Two: Identity Theft
Watch the video about a person’s personal story about identity theft. After you finish watching the video, discuss the following questions with your partner(s).
Questions
- Who is telling the story?
- What happened to her?
- What were some of the main events in the story?
- What was her advice to people about preventing identity theft?
Teacher's Note
- Audrey Burns, an identity theft victim
- She wanted a loan from the bank to buy her grandson a car for his birthday. However, she found out that her identity was stolen and someone was using her credit card to make purchases.
- The series of events as she told it:
- Audrey decided to buy a car for her grandson as a birthday gift
- She made an appointment at the bank
- A loan manager found that she had outstanding debt in her account so she decided to check it further
- The loan manager asked if she owned a Freedom credit card to which Audrey said no.
- She is informed that she had a $28,000 debt.
- She went to the police station to make a report
- 2 weeks later, the detective informed her that on August 3rd, a credit card was applied for using a different address.
- She found out the person using the address was a contractor that helped her build a fence for her house and used a pre-authorized credit card application in her garbage to make a credit card.
- The detective informed her that she should have shredded the mail
- Everyone should shred anything that has their name and address on it to prevent identity theft.
Part Three: Narrative Tenses
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