A Successful Photoshop Breakout Today! #busedu #worktogether

As a computer teacher, it's often hard to find good "cooperative learning" activities or provide solid opportunities for productive group work that doesn't turn into one person doing all the work and everyone else taking credit. But, my students have quite enjoyed my first two attempts at digital Breakout EDU in the computer lab!

Today, we did the newest Breakout I created for Photoshop. It's here, so check it out!

https://sites.google.com/site/photoshopbreakout1/

I learned much from creating my first one, and I decided to make this one a bit more challenging and the groups bigger even though I was afraid some people might fall through the cracks a bit. I took a chance and out of about 40 students, I truly only had one who I felt was "not engaged" in the activity and wasn't actively working with a group like he should have been.

My first step this time was to provide them with a teeny overview of what a Breakout is on our class website bellringer-- (adapted from https://sites.google.com/site/digitalbreakoutjb/faq)

How do you play a Breakout EDU Digital game?
Breakout EDU Digital games come fully loaded and ready to play - no setup required. Simply navigate to the page and begin looking for clues on the page and connected pages. You might find something in a foreign language, pictures with hidden messages, or QR codes that you can scan with your phone or the QR code Chrome Extension. Our best advice - click on everything possible. If you see something clickable, it’s worth a look. Other clue types include bolded letters, Google Apps documents, invisible text, and whatever else we can come up with! The games require a degree of critical thinking and will not always be completely straightforward. Additionally, some clues act as red herrings (decoys to throw you off). Your goal will be to solve the lock codes (dates, directions, words, numbers) until all are correct.. and then, you win!

What do I need to play?
All you need is an internet connection and a device! You can use your computer and/or your phones, but your team will need to submit the "final locks" on one machine to unlock the game and win. It's helpful to try to work together to solve puzzles more quickly. Your team will be given two CLUE CARDS that you may give to your teacher during the game to help you, but all must agree when to use them and for what part of the game. Otherwise, you cannot use the teacher for help.

If you finish before the hour is up, you will win a prize. :)

I put four sheets of paper on the board with numbers to match how many students were in the class and gave each group an animal name (Llamas, Penguins, etc.).  They were told to sign up on a line in a group of their choice (and since it wasn't "go grab a partner" if you didn't know anyone, you could just sign a line and not feel weird about it) as they walked in. Then, I gave a short intro to the activity, told them they could use computers and/or phones, and that if they worked together well, they might indeed win and get a prize! I also let them know they were only competing against the clock, not against a neighbor group (but not to share answers anyway).

I also provided each group with two HINT cards, which is done in the non-digital version but I didn't think about the first time I ran a game. They had to all sign the back and write which lock they wanted a hint for or which puzzle/clue they wanted help with. Otherwise, they couldn't talk to me during the hour and had to work together to try to solve the locks.

Here is a group of 5, spread out moving back and forth, turning monitors to share information, and working very well together. These guys actually finished the fastest today, in about 30 minutes!

Once a group was able to find all the locks and "win" the game, I took their pictures and treated each group with a candy bag, which they could divide as they saw fit.  Here are my 5 winning groups from today! 

Some thoughts going in to creating my next one....

1. Always have a "pretty easy" lock so they can experience some easy success. 
2. Have at least three people play your game and get feedback before you use a game. For this one, I modified it a bit after feedback from both students and adults who played my game. I added a random word that was buried in some "invisible" text to help them "hint" that there was text over there, a "quote" above a slideshow that helped tell you what to look for in the slideshow, and provided some "help letters" on the crossword/word puzzle to make it easier to complete. These were good changes and things I might not have done without feedback from about 6 people.
3. Provide a tangible reward. I didn't hand out candy the first time I ran one. This time, each team knew a bag of treats was on the line! And, I didn't let them keep the card that I took their pictures with, but a few students asked why they didn't get to keep the card, so maybe they need some sort of "certificate" or something. I know some of the ones I've participated in provided a badge or something for completers.

I'm already looking forward to creating another one! My next one will be in Web Design and will be a hybrid one since I am kicked out of my lab for Aspire testing on November 1. I hope to create physical clues but use an iPad or tablet as the "lock box" for each group. I already have two clues figured out! But, I plan to create a physical version AND a complementary digital version of that one in case someone does want to run it without printing clues.

If you have any good ideas for Web Design or Photoshop locks, let me know!