Escape the Room – updated 2023

Update 28 November 2023

If you’re looking for an activity for Christmas and have around £100 to spend, you can create a Computer-Science-themed “Escape the Room” challenge (actually more of an “Open the Box”) which you can use again and again. This year I’ve been through the resources and updated the links to the hardware you need to buy and the prices, and it’s striking how much more expensive everything is since I first created this resource. Back in 2018 it all cost £74, now the same items come to about £135! Feel free to adapt as necessary e.g. swap out the directional padlock for a standard numeric one (and change the related clue) to save about £20.

All the files are here on my Onedrive including a PowerPoint which contains full teacher instructions, the student instructions and the printable clues and reference posters. You will also find the Morse code wav file and an editable “bitmap” spreadsheet for creating different bitmap clues (if you want to run this again).

Original post follows from 2019.

Big thanks go to Claire Wicher (@GirlGeekUpNorth) for her resource which gave me a starting point, and I’ve kept in a lot of her content. Claire’s lesson was intended to fit into a standard 50-60 minute lesson, with preamble and review, hence it was too short for my purposes. This one should take 1-2 hours depending on ability and how much help you give them.

The slides are largely self-explanatory. If you open the Powerpoint you will find instructions and an inventory of parts. The objective is to open a chest by solving puzzles which reveal combinations for the six locks. There’s a twist at the end though, just for laughs and that extra feeling of achievement.

I hope you enjoy this free resource, and if you want to thank me you know what to do…