Escape room - education games

Innovator: Katarina Veljković, https://www.linkedin.com/in/katarina-veljkovic-7b940424/

Organisation: First grammar school, Kragujevac

Setting of the practice: online 

Description of the practice:

Today, most students are capable of using technology in ways that seem mysterious and incomprehensible to most adults, especially teachers. Today's students can adapt to the use of modern technology in the classroom much faster than a teacher or parent needs to. But there is always the question of how effectively students use technology for learning. Therefore, encouraging teachers to use a variety of technological tools for different teaching activities can encourage students not only to be interested in learning but also truly understand concepts and phenomena in science and society. The use of the virtual world (Minecraft) in the teaching process has proven to be a strong "means" for developing the necessary skills for the 21st century in future generations. The teaching is designed to be inspiring and the teacher has the role of a mentor and a guide toward the achievement of learning goals. I encourage students to express their creativity and develop critical thinking precisely through the use of information and communication technology (ICT) by placing them in real situations (choice of work, historical events, digital literacy,...). By using technology in his/hers classes, the teacher will develop students' skills necessary for work and life in the 21st century (digital literacy, collaboration, problem-solving, creativity, innovation, research, and analysis). Creating a virtual educational package - Escape Room transforms a teaching topic into a form that is understandable and receptive to today's generation. As the Minecraft environment is, today, the most represented in the educational world, we use it to create different worlds in which we can translate valid teaching material into a virtual world in which students and teachers will be immersed in the teaching process by solving set tasks. Through various set activities and characters, the student goes through the world and thus gets to know different situations, tasks, and events,... Students solve different sets of puzzles and quizzes, based on a scenario for another teaching topic. In the game, the teacher can choose to what level she wants to cover the chosen topic. After students complete a learning activity or assessment task, the teacher provides them (in virtual worlds) with a set of criteria that they use to evaluate the quality of their knowledge. Students are put in a position to think about why they achieved that level of quality and whether they could do something differently in the future to achieve a different/higher level of quality. The learning activities consist of the following activities: Preparation of materials on the subject of Digital Literacy (analysis of the curriculum for informatics and computer science), Designing scenarios - different tasks for individual rooms on the theme of Digital Literacy: Internet, Searching the Internet, Reliability of information on the Internet and copyright and licenses, Online identity (identity on the Internet), Safe behavior on the Internet, Use of digital devices and health, E-mail and work with shared documents, Open data; Conceiving and designing a virtual educational package (game); Creating each room individually that is in line with the Digital Literacy curriculum; Testing each room, all possible solutions; Correction of observed errors; Presenting the Escape Room by creating a video and posting it on all social networks for the teacher and parents; Exploitation - Using the Escape Room.