I've decided that perhaps if I spend each Friday morning updating this, that will be a start in the right direction - so, on that note. This week was our final week before the winter break. One of my recent discoveries is a great website called BreakoutEDU. Along the lines of the escape room concept that is so popular right now, students solve a set of clues to "breakout" whatever is in the locked boxes. Thanks to a DonorsChoose project we have four Breakout boxes that we can use for activities. Fourth grade did one at Halloween called Monster Mash to get us started, and this week all four classes did The Elf on a Shelf in a Box activity - where the elves have accidentally locked themselves in the breakout boxes (along with pencils and candy canes) and need to be rescued. The quickest group to finish was a fourth grade group - it took them an hour and 33 minutes to get their box open! No one else even came close!!
In addition to the fun, just observing the students taught me so much about their reasoning, problem solving, and cooperative skills. Some groups worked so well together, and those were the ones who solved the puzzles and opened the boxes. Others groups, EVERYONE wanted to be in charge - they argued, grabbed things from each other and ended up accomplishing nothing but upsetting each other. I realized, we need to do more activities where they have to work together and cooperate to accomplish a task.. and on that note it was a great learning activity for us all!!
Check out the YEScholars Twitter feed on the right to see some photos of the activity.
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