To facilitate small group collaboration and teamwork in her German 4 class, Ms. Cindi Hodgdon has students work on a series of escape room challenges.
Using their knowledge of the German language, geography and culture, students must answer questions of increasing difficulty. The questions are based on clues embedded in the classroom and, at times, only detectable with the use of UV light (see photo series below). German YouTube videos challenge the students’ comprehension of German spoken at regular conversational speed. Each correct solution permits students to unlock containers which are employ with a variety of locks: combination locks based on numbers and words, padlocks, and directional movement locks.
During the challenge, Ms. Hodgdon observes the levels of collaboration and teamwork using ConVal’s schoolwide Collaboration rubric. After an hour of intense work, the team answers the challenge question — “Sie haben es geschafft!” (“They succeeded!”). The question was about a German luxury car brand, a topic that ties in with their curriculum unit on German cars, German car manufacturing, and German driving habits on the Autobahn.
