Escape the (Remote) Classroom: An Online Escape Room for Remote Learning

Abstract

An online virtual escape-room game was created using the Google Forms survey app for an undergraduate chemistry lab class. Zoom video conferencing service was used to make the activity a collaborative learning experience. The theme was an escape from an abandoned chocolate factory, and the students solved problems to move to the next section or “room” on the Google Forms survey.

Comparing Face-to-Face and Remote Educational Escape Rooms for Learning Programming

“…Different researchers have reported on using educational escape rooms in a wide variety of fields such as nursing [13], [14], [17], medicine [8], [15], [18], [19], [22], physiotherapy [6], pharmacy [9], [12], [16], [23]- [25], [43], physics [10], chemistry [20], [21], [26], [27], [31], [42], biology [28], [29], cryptography [44], mathematics [35], [36], programming, [32], [33], software modeling [34] and computer networks [7]. These studies have provided firm experimental evidence that educational escape rooms can produce positive impacts on student engagement [6], [9], [12]- [36] and learning [9], [24], [29], [30], [33], [34].…”

“…More often than not, the puzzles combined field-specific knowledge and skills with generic puzzle mechanics found in ludic escape rooms such as opening combination locks, finding keys, assembling objects, etc [2]. A few works have transcended the physical barrier and developed purely virtual or digital educational escape rooms [26], [29]- [31], [34], [35], [42]. In spite of the fact that the educational escape rooms reported in said works were completely virtual, in more than half of them ([29]- [31], [35]) the activities were hosted as face-to-face events, although in [31] the possibility of playing remotely and individually as a homework assignment was also given to students.…”

“…In spite of the fact that the educational escape rooms reported in said works were completely virtual, in more than half of them ([29]- [31], [35]) the activities were hosted as face-to-face events, although in [31] the possibility of playing remotely and individually as a homework assignment was also given to students. Thus, only three works [26], [34], [42] reported on remote educational escape rooms conducted as synchronous events in which several students participated simultaneously.…”

“…Sociocultural engagement may also be affected by this delivery format, since collaboration between members can be challenging to perform remotely as well. Although a few virtual educational escape rooms can be found in the literature [26], [29]- [31], [34], [35], [42], only four works [26], [31], [34], [42], to the knowledge of the authors, reported on the use of remote educational escape rooms. However, said works did not compare the effectiveness of face-to-face and remote educational escape rooms.…”

Evaluating an Educational Escape Room Conducted Remotely for Teaching Software Engineering

“…The results of the survey administered to the students after participating in either the face-to-face or remote educational escape rooms showed that both educational escape rooms obtained very positive results in terms of motivation. Similarly, [36] reported on the creation of an online virtual escape room for an undergraduate chemistry class. The Zoom video conferencing service was used to make the activity a collaborative learning experience by separating students' teams in different rooms.…”