In this article, the authors describe how to construct a mock crime scene, acquire a pig carcass, sample its arthropod fauna, integrate photographic, climatic and arthropod successional data, and estimate the postmortem interval (PMI) from insect successional timetables. The experimental layout described in this article represents the untreated control or background condition (i.e., surface-exposed, unclothed, and unscavenged by vertebrates) against which other treatments can be compared (i.e., buried, burned, submerged, clothed, or vertebrate scavenged). Exposing pairs of carcasses to contrasting environmental and biological conditions invites students to explore factors that affect carcass decay rates, order and timing of arthropod succession, and species composition. This activity can be incorporated into a high school or college-level forensic science, entomology, or ecology course to illustrate working principles of forensic entomology or ecological succession or both. Outputs of this activity can be stored in electronic (Excel) spreadsheets (or tabulated on graph paper) and/or digitized images and then discussed in relation to actual cases published in the forensic science literature. Some of the outcomes students are likely to experience (i.e., see, smell, touch, and even hear) are listed. (Contains 5 tables and 10 figures.)