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Escape rooms are all the rage these days. So why not use the automatic engagement of what students already love to create an Escape Room Party in the classroom.
Now before you decide that an Escape Room Party sounds like a lot of work – keep reading. These Escape Room classroom activities require no props, no hidden clues and no locks! Low Prep for you and fun practice and review for the students – now that is a Win-Win!
In an actual escape room, a group of people get locked in a room and must work together to find the code to unlock the door. You get the code by finding and solving puzzles as a team. Take that same idea and put it in the classroom, minus the locked in the room part, of course. A classroom escape room activity is a challenge where students work together in groups to complete a variety of skill based activities in order to earn clues that allow them to solve a problem or complete a goal.
Students love escape room activities and often don’t even realize how much they are learning, practicing and reviewing. Looking for an academic based activity for a class party? How about a party to engage your students in academics? Create an Escape Room Party! What student would not love that?!? Try it once and you’ll be looking for reasons to have a party.
So, maybe Thanksgiving isn’t a normal “party” day in school. But now it can be with this Thanksgiving themed escape room activity!
This Thanksgiving themed escape room resource focuses on the skill of multiplication. In this downloadable resource you actually get two versions of the escape room; one for single digit multiplication and the other for double digit multiplication. Use one or mix and match to help your students practice these important skills.
The tasks in this escape room focus on finding the product, finding the product and determining if it is odd or even, multiplication based word problems and a logic puzzle.
To prepare, all you need to do is print and copy the activities for your students. If you are going to use the awards or prizes you can get those ready in advance, too. No need to gather unusual or costly props. No need to spend hours hiding clues and prepping puzzles. And you definitely won’t need to lock your students in the room. They will be so engaged in learning that they won’t be going anywhere!
Generally, escape rooms are done in groups. This encourages cooperation, group problem solving skills and collaboration. An escape room in the classroom is no different. Small groups of 3 to 4 students works well for the escape room activities. Divide your students into groups or teams, or at least determine how many groups you will have. You will need to know the number of groups as your copy the activities. You will only need one copy per group, not one per student. Once your copies are made, just organize them by activity so that you will be able to access them as each group needs them.
To begin the Escape Room party, you will give each group the intro letter and turkey. This will give them an introduction into the escape room and get them started. All of the instructions are included and each activity is self-guided. You can monitor the activities but your involvement will be minimal.
As groups finish each task they will bring you their completed activity. If they have all the answers correct, you will give them the “clue” (in this case a turkey feather) and the next activity. If they have something incorrect, they will need to go back and make corrections before moving on. Depending on the level of challenge you want to include, you could either tell them what is incorrect or you could have them find their own mistakes.
Once a group has completed all 5 activities correctly and received all of their turkey feathers they will have finished the escape room.
This resource includes an award certificate and a prize idea that you can use too. Students can celebrate completing the escape room with cute certificates or edible turkey prizes.
If you are looking to add some writing practice into your day, you can easily add a creative writing task to your Escape Room Party. Once the group has finished all 5 tasks and has received all the turkey feathers, they would be ready to write.
In the introduction of the escape room, the students learned that the turkey needed to find his feathers so that he could get dressed for a big turkey party. Have the group turn the turkey feathers into a party outfit for the turkey. They can work together to design the outfit, color or decorate the feathers, then write to describe the turkey’s new clothing. Finish the day with a turkey fashion show. {This writing part could be completed in groups or individually. If you choose to do this individually, make sure to copy enough feathers for each student.}
Your classroom Escape Room Party is sure to be a hit. Whether you use this Thanksgiving Escape Room on the last day of school before the holiday when excitement is high and academic focus is tough, or earlier in November to build engagement with a holiday themed activity, your students will love practicing their multiplication skills with this Turkey Escape Room Activity!
Thanksgiving might not be in the near future when you read this post. No worries! You do not have wait until next November to give the Escape Room Classroom Party a try. Here’s some other low prep, skill based escape rooms that your students will love.
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Engaging our learners through fun and creative means is often the key to increasing learning that leads to mastery. If you like this Escape Room Activity you will love these other activities too!
Hi, I’m Shelly! Thank you for being here. I love helping third, fourth, and fifth grade teachers with fun and engaging activities that require no to little prep! Let me help you by taking some of the stress and work off your plate.
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