No Escape: the rise of Escape Rooms in secondary biology education. What do teachers and students perceive as the educational potential of Escape Rooms in secondary biology education?

Since the creation of the first Escape Room (ER) in 2007, the phenomenon has risen to immense global popularity in the entertainment industry. Nowadays, ERs are gaining popularity as learning environments for secundary science education. Projects such as Breakout EDU promote the introduction of ERs and claim that they result in motivated, active students who work together on content knowledge while developing skills in communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity. Despite increased implementation in education no research is known yet in relation to ERs in secondary education. In this paper, the education potential of ERs for secondary biology education is explored and determined regarding possible learning goals and their usability and feasibility in classrooms. Therefore, the views of participants in an educational biology Escape Room were analysed. One hundred biology classes in 100 secondary schools took part in a national “Escape the Classroom” event. Classroom observations were made in fourteen classes. Afterwards, eleven teachers and 69 students were interviewed, in 17 groups consisting of three to six students (aged 11-14). Furthermore, 39 teachers and 202 students responded to an online questionnaire. This paper presents a summary of the outcomes on teacher and student views. Out of the 50 teachers who were interviewed or filled in the questionnaire, 42 indicated that they intended to do an educational ER again. The most often assigned triggers for learning were: the game element, the (doable) challenge and the unknown prize. Of the students, 90% would like to do another ER. According to them, you need to “think deeply” in the ER and be more “mutually dependent” than in usual team tasks. Both groups agree on the ERs’ usability for education for various, but not all, possible learning goals. In interviews, unlike the teachers, students were skeptical about using an ER for assessment. On the aspect of feasibility, some teachers assigned the balance of “learning outcomes of students versus time investment for the teacher”. Results show that Escape Rooms have educational potential for secondary biology education. However, the claimed developed skills such as communication, collaboration and thinking skills, appeared to be needed in order to understand and solve the content based activities. In ERs, learning biology, and the social skills required, should be supported by a teacher skilled in monitoring, guiding and debriefing. Currently, we are analysing the classroom observations in order to develop guidelines for educational Escape Rooms.