Our first Breakout!

I was inspired at EdCampSEMass to try BreakoutEDU.  I was under the misconception that this was more for middle and high school students.  After hearing how a 4th grade teacher used this in conjunction with her read aloud I was inspired to give this a try in my own school.

When a 5th grade teacher approached me for a book recommendation (a mystery), I jumped on the opportunity to present BreakoutEDU.  She wanted to introduce the genre and this would be the perfect opportunity for her class to manipulate and decipher clues.

My first "breakout" was on my own children.  I used a pre-made activity from the BreakoutEDU site and practiced on my own children before I had the teacher breakout.

My test subjects - my own children

Once she had the experience, she was hooked.  It was time to create our first BreakoutEDU experience.

We met to determine the content of the experience.  We decided to use current 5th grade topics of study

• Planets 
• 13 colonies 
• Revolutionary War 
• Multiplication of decimals 
• One Book One School read, Mr. Popper's Penguins

We devised one clue to serve as a model, that the class would work through together.  This clue would unlock the small box that held tools to solve other clues.  It took several tries to successfully break in to the first box but each student that tried, explained their thinking and that helped each successive student.

The class worked through the 1st clue together

The 1st clue broke into the small box which revealed tools for solving other clues

Once we had our first success as a class, the group was divided into 4 smaller groups to decipher the assigned clue.  Three out of four groups were able to complete this successfully without hints.  The fourth group needed a hint to get started.  Once they knew what they were looking for, they were able to make rapid progress, but they spent a good portion of time stuck.

Once all locks were opened the group reassembled on the rug to talk through the experience.  Students shared:

• I like how everyone helped out.
• We were frustrated because some questions were confusing. We had to read them a few times.
• We can now work better together. We learned about working with each other.
• What you try first might not work.
• You have to work with people your whole life.
• Try new things.
• Take risks.

My takeaways

Students were engaged, working cooperatively and thinking creatively.  Would I do this again?  Absolutely!  I surely wouldn't do this regularly, as the novelty would wear off, but I would love to have students participate once or twice and then create their OWN clues.  I would love to see students wrapping up a unit and furthering their thinking by creating their own Breakout EDU activity.  

I am scheduled to do this activity with the other 5th grade teachers soon.  I am curious to see what they think.  I will share our experiences with other grades and see where we will go from there.