Students from the STEM Club at 冰球突破豪华版试玩 had so much fun attending group outings at a Portsmouth escape room, 他们决定创造自己的. In designing and building a series of progressive “smart” puzzles for a Great Bay escape room, 学生们正在学习与电子有关的技能, 工程, 还有自动化——同时享受乐趣.
“密室逃生”, 在我心中, is a fun way to learn new subjects while creating something,” said Great Bay student and STEM Club member 莎拉·吉拉德. “I’ve learned a lot about coding and building 电子产品, and we are only on the first few puzzles. It opens the gateway to finding interest in something I may never have thought of otherwise.”
迈克·戈登, chemistry professor and faculty adviser for the STEM Club, said the idea of students creating their own escape room stemmed from the fun they had attending a commercial escape room in Portsmouth. “As part of our club activities, we just decided to make one on campus,” 他说. “It’s been a lot of fun, and the students deserve all the credit. 他们有足够的动力让这一切发生.”
密室逃生是一款互动冒险游戏, where players are metaphorically locked in a room until they escape by finding hidden clues and solving puzzles to complete a mission within a specific time, 通常是一个小时. 随着每一个谜题的解开, players get more clues to progress to the next puzzle until all secrets are unlocked – or until time runs out.
The STEM俱乐部学生 are still working on their puzzles and games related to Great Bay and academic themes associated with the college. The students won’t have a dedicated space where they can host their escape room, so they are creating a series of portable puzzles they will be able to move around to different locations on campus. “I hope for ours to function as a ‘traveling escape room’ so it will be able to be picked up and moved to a new location out of necessity,吉拉德说. “But I also hope the students to be able to get the genuine feel of escaping the room, 不仅仅是解决谜题.”
The escape room has been in development since at least the spring semester of 2023, STEM俱乐部成员、学生卡罗琳·马布尔说. “The puzzles range from computer science, to chemistry, to physics topics—a range of STEM topics. A date to release the escape room has not been announced,”她说。.
Girard hopes the escape room is finished by the end of the academic year and that enthusiasm carries it forward.
学生们的主题是“逃离大海湾”,，其中包括课堂设置, 多学科领域, and either a key to leave school or a diploma to prove students “passed the test” and graduated. “We are trying to have puzzles that touch on each area of STEM,吉拉德说. “The puzzle we are working on currently is going to be a Russian nesting doll-influenced puzzle, where you solve one puzzle that opens the box to another puzzle, which will open the box to a helping hand to another puzzle. 我们也有化学、生物和天文学难题.”
The STEM Club at Great Bay is open to all students, regardless of their field of study. “不是STEM专业的人也在STEM俱乐部, 每个人都有自己的观点,戈登说。. “制造一个密室逃生听起来可能不太‘有创意’,“如果你愿意的话。, but none of the students in our club have backgrounds in networking, 电子产品, 或工程. All are learning new fields and new skills to execute this project. So they are all stepping out of their comfort zone to learn these new skills.”
While some puzzles require academic knowledge or “good-old fashioned sleuthing” to solve, 戈登说, many are “smart” puzzles with embedded electronic systems. Designing and building them requires skills and knowledge related to graphical programming, 电路, 布线, 和自动化.
本学期早些时候, the students held a “soldering party” with assistance from Michael Harrison, program coordinator and associate professor of Information Systems Technology at Great Bay, where they melded components and began turning their ideas into reality.
Harrison credited the students for embracing the technology and “designing on the fly. … It’s kind of fun to see the 工程 part of it creep into what might have been simply puzzles.” They are building electronically intelligent games that will be easily passed to and maintained by future students, 他说, noting that many of these students will benefit from having a practical handle on these skills no matter their field of study or profession.
密室逃生项目帮助重振了STEM俱乐部. 在大流行之前，它有多达20个成员. 现在，这个数字还不到那个数字的一半. “但他们正在反弹，”戈登说. “俱乐部非常积极主动. In the past couple of months, they have made as much as progress as they did in all of last year. After a lot of thinking and brainstorming last year, there is a lot of doing this year. 我真的为这个团队感到骄傲.”
吉拉德很享受在俱乐部的时光, and she encouraged more students to consider getting involved. “I’ve always been interested in science and 工程–math not so much. But I thought it would be fun to join a club that allows you to learn new information in a hands-on manner without the pressure of grades or tests,”她说。. “你可以专注于某些主题, learning with your peers or a professional in a fun and relaxed manner.”
