Breaking Out (Of Our Comfort Zone)

I've been quietly watching and reading about the Breakout EDU movement for about a year now.  If you're unfamiliar with the concept, it's basically a challenging, collaborative learning activity designed to make students think critically about clues in order to unlock a box.  The idea is that the puzzles and clues require students to not only use critical thinking skills, but also to apply knowledge of course content in the process.  It's a genius concept and one that is engaging and fun for everyone.

A year ago when I started seeing talk of Breakouts in education on Twitter, I quickly registered on the Breakout EDU website to get access to some of the pre-made games, and I joined the Breakout EDU Facebook page.  I read everything I could, and I was intimidated.

How could I come up with something so creative?  What was I supposed to put in the box?  What if nobody was able to breakout?  What if my clues were terribly constructed?  What if I couldn't figure out how to make my content fit all the locks?  I labored over these questions for almost a year before I decided to finally just give it a shot.

In January, I reached out to the almost 20,000 people on the Breakout EDU Facebook page to get advice for using Breakout with staff as professional development, and the people who commented got me on the right track.

My starting point was a pre-made game called TEAMWORK on the Breakout site.  I modified it to fit the staff in my building and started to wrap my head around how this whole Breakout EDU concept might work for us!  I started brainstorming ideas with my principal, and we had to purchase a box and a few extra locks to make it work.

Last Friday we had a PD day, and we took the opportunity to Breakout!  We had eight teams; each team had a letter in the word TEAMWORK as a starting point for their clues.  Teams had to go throughout the building to solve their clues and ultimately unlock the eight locks.  For instance, the "T" team had the clue "Timeline" and four events from the history of our school that they had to put in chronological order.  They had to recall where all the yearbooks were kept in the library to get their events in order.  On the back of all their events was a code written in invisible ink, which they needed a black light to solve.  The black light was hidden in a small box that another group had to open based on their clues.  There were puzzles for each of the letters in TEAMWORK, and each team had a lock that they were responsible for unlocking in order to get the box opened.

They broke out in about 40 minutes!

Here's what we learned after our first breakout:

• When ideas become so big that they scare us, we have to reach out to our PLN for help. Without that Breakout Facebook page, I'm not sure I would have ever gotten started with planning this.

• Don't be afraid to use your colleagues in the building to bounce ideas off of.  I'm lucky to have a great working relationship with my principal who was able to help with the planning process for this as a staff development activity.

• Our teacher brains are not wired to let others struggle.  It was so hard for me to see the groups struggling and to not jump in and help, but the struggle is an important part of the process.

• Don't be afraid to make it challenging.  I was fearful that some of our clues would be too hard, but the groups still worked through the struggle successfully.

• Planning the clues takes a little practice.  We had one group who didn't quite have enough clues and got pretty frustrated while on their wild goose chase.  This group used a hint card, and we gave too much away with the hint.  Next time, we'd be able to find just the right amount of clues/hints to give them.

• Have someone double check all your clues and locks.  I had done my math wrong (former English teacher here) on one of the puzzles and would have had the lock set wrong!  That would have been a disaster, but luckily my principal caught it when he was helping me double check everything.

• Taking a risk is worth it even if you fail or partially fail.  The Breakout game was fun and engaging (even though I was stressed about planning it for a few weeks), and teachers were able to brainstorm ways they could use this in their classes with kids in the future.  The risk of trying this for the first time paid off!

Overall it was a great afternoon.  My only regret was that I waited a year to get started with Breakout EDU.  If you're thinking about trying a Breakout, make sure you use the resources, your colleagues, and your PLN.  Most importantly, though, just give it a shot and see how it goes!