January 24 was the start of the Chinese New Year. Eighth and sixth-grade Mandarin students helped mark the occasion through an escape game. Mandarin teacher, Mr. Venturin, and librarians, Ms. Stouff and Ms. Leger, adapted the premise of this life-size escape game to an educational setting.
The goal of an escape game is to solve puzzles on a given theme in order to escape from a room in which the players (usually in a small group) are imaginarily held inside. Escape room exercises are great project-based learning tools, as they help students find solutions to challenges all the while building their knowledge in specific subjects.
In this version, students had to go from one room in the Secondary library to another to find the key to open one of the meeting rooms which had been transformed for the occasion into an altar to the God of the Hearth, the emblematic deity of the Chinese New Year.
The scenario was simple: Several days before the game, the students received an invitation from the God of the Hearth for tea at the Secondary library. But once they had gotten there and drunk their tea, the God of the Hearth revealed to them in a video that they had been poisoned and had only 45 minutes to gather Chinese characters that were scattered throughout the Secondary library and to bring them to his altar!
All of the puzzles blended computer and information skills, such as navigating through the Secondary library, knowing how to use the online catalogue, understanding a call number, as well as modern language skills in Mandarin, combining written and oral comprehension and expression.
The students got caught up in the game and quickly developed an efficient group dynamic, dividing up the tasks in solving the puzzles and searching for hidden clues. The escape game revealed their bold and clever spirit, with the urgency of the clock that was ticking on the Smartboard throughout the session. Each of them, with their know-how, was able to shine within the group, since the puzzles required differentiated skills.
All throughout the game, the teachers were present and available to help as ‘lifelines,’ if the students so wished. Neither of the two groups utilized their lifelines!
Both classes finished in time, sometimes a split second before the timer ran out!
Students and teachers alike were proud of the accomplishment. In brief, this was a highly appreciated and fun educational moment.
Photos by James Charrel.
About the Author :
Mélanie Stouff has been a Secondary librarian at the Lycée since 2018. She holds certification in library science and studied literature at the Maison d’Education de la Légion d’honneur, as well as art history at the École du Louvre. She has a degree in English at the University of Bordeaux, studies which included a year at the University of Oklahoma.