How Escape Room Games Benefit Students

If you’ve successfully completed an escape room game before, you’ll know all about how rewarding the challenge can be. 

Now, imagine you were a little younger and managed this type of achievement in front of a classroom of your peers? Doubly rewarding! 

Escape room games have become increasingly popular over the past few years as a great way to connect with friends and as a corporate team-building activity. But what about as an educational tool for children? 

This blog highlights the learning benefits of escape room games and how they can be implemented… 

What is an Escape Room Challenge? 

Never done an escape room challenge before? That’s ok, you’re not alone. For some people, the idea of being locked up in a room and timed on how quickly you can break out of it may seem daunting. 

But all-in-all, an escape room challenge is designed to be fun, interactive, and mentally challenging. 

Each challenge involves a series of puzzles and riddles which follow a narrative thread. As you solve one puzzle, you are presented with the next, until you successfully solve the entire challenge. 

Essentially, an escape room offers a creative way for friends, colleagues, and even students to engage their problem-solving brain. Research has shown that the act of puzzle-solving is extremely beneficial for brain function and overall brain activity. 

To add to this, the mental challenge, achievement, and camaraderie involved in an escape room challenge is a great mood booster. So, how do escape room games actually benefit learners of a younger age?  

The Learning Benefits of Escape Room Games 

Aside from being a whole new way of teaching your students a new subject, an escape room challenge is a great way to install a new sense of inspiration.

Young learners are impressionable and will be inspired by the knowledge they gain through the achievement of completing the challenge. Ultimately, this will teach them to set and accomplish goals. As well as communicate effectively, learn to think outside-the-box, and be courageous. 

To add to this, escape room challenge also benefits you as a teacher. It shows that you are forward-thinking and keen to inspire your students to do better and be better. 

Here are a few of the additional learning benefits of escape room games: 

1. All Learning Styles are Highlighted 

As you may already know, each student absorbs and learns new information in a different way. What may work best for one student doesn’t always resonate with another. 

But when it comes to escape room games, all learning styles are covered. This includes visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learners. These games are all-inclusive and allow each student to shine in their own way.  

2. Encourages Critical Thinking

On a normal, everyday basis in the classroom, how often would your students be exposed to instances of critical thinking? In other words, how often would they be put under pressure to think on their toes and use their logic? 

Critical thinking is super important in many real-world scenarios, especially as an adult. This is where an escape room challenge can help them to hone this skill and become better equipped at facing the ”real world”. 

3. Sparks the Attention Span 

If you’re looking for a way to grab and hold onto your students’ attention span, then an escape room challenge is your best bet. 

These timed challenges spark the attention span and encourage students to focus to the best of their ability. This means they are far more likely to absorb and remember new subject matter in a shorter space of time, to boot.  

4. Installs a Motivation to Learn   

There are certain elements of escape room games that are similar to video gaming and role-playing games. If there was anything your students could relate it to, it’s this! 

This means that an escape room challenge can really resonate with certain students who will be all-the-more enthusiastic about participating. Ultimately, this installs a whole new motivation to learn. 

5. Encourages Teamwork and Communication 

An escape room challenge is not usually solved by one person alone. It encourages students to work together and pool their talents in order to solve all the puzzles and riddles in time.

Basically, this means that students have to learn to work together and communicate openly and clearly. Even if they’ve never communicated before in a classroom environment. 

This type of teamwork also allows natural leaders to emerge. This gives you a chance to leverage this peer authority to improve classroom dynamics.  

6. Inspires Blooms Taxonomy

The point of an escape room game is to challenge all parts of the brain.

This means that your students will move past their basic knowledge of comprehension of a subject. Essentially, an escape room challenge inspires the evaluation levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy.

Your students are encouraged to decipher which tasks are more complex and specific according to the goals they wish to achieve.  

7. Teaches Game Design and Theory 

While some students may find this fascinating, others may not. But an escape room challenge allows students to explore the theory and design behind building and planning games. 

Today, this type of career path is becoming extremely popular and lucrative, based in the fields of IT engineering and online gaming. 

8. Fires Up Problem-Solving Skills 

Finally, one of the most obvious benefits of an escape room challenge is firing up the problem-solving side of the brain. And in today’s world, a problem-solving, quick-thinking brain can take you very far. 

In short, these games encourage a hands-on demonstration of logical principals, and the importance of logic is never to be underestimated.