Here, as the last Digital Play blog post of the year, is Nada’s idea for the December Escape Game. Well done Nada! A copy of Digital Play (the book) is on the way to you.

December Escape Game Lesson Plan

Level: Beginners
Language: body parts, furniture, prepositions of place
Function: asking questions (to be)
Skills: speaking
Location: the connected classroom
Game: December Escape Game

Pre-play
Revise vocabulary by labelling body parts and furniture (December Escape Game YLE Worksheet).

Play
Tell your students that Santa has to deliver the presents but has been locked in the room. On top of that, he is missing his clothes. They are to help him find his clothes, find the key and escape the room. There are some things hidden in the room and students’ task is to guide the teacher where to click by asking:  ‘’Is there something behind/under/in… ‘’ .  Find all the missing pieces and help Santa out.

Post Play
Write a letter to Santa.

Thanks for this great idea, Nada, and thanks to all of our readers! Wishing you Seasons Greetings and looking forward to sharing more digital play with you all in 2012!

1  Point and click

These games rely on you moving the cursor around the screen and clicking the mouse.  By printing off a written walkthrough or by using a video walkthrough, a large variety of language activities can be generated.   Try a relay dictation using either a written or video walkthrough or simply use either of them yourself to dictate game play.  Alternatively check out these games – the anti-bullying Dixie the Nerd, a selection of ten point-and-click games and their walkthroughs or Windosill.

2 Escape the room

A sub genre of point and click games where typically you have to find and possibly combine objects in a room or house to get out through a locked door.  As previously mentioned above, with a written walkthrough or a video walkthrough a large variety of language activities can be generated.  You could also get learners to write out their own walkthroughs as they play.  Alternatively check out these games – MOTAS, Kitchen Escape or the scary reader for the the zombie game I Remain.

3 Arcade

Arcade games generally rely on reaction speeds rather than logic or puzzle solving skills. Passing to the next stage usually means completing a simple task within a specific time limit. The next stage and subsequent stages usually require the player to complete the same task but with an increasing complexity or in a faster time. Language generated tends to be quite simple and repetitive.  Some of these games are great for drilling the language of directions (pacman), colours (sveerz) and spelling (Alphaattack and Type ‘em up).

4. Puzzle Games

These games tend to be quite abstract and typically involve arranging geometric forms to achieve a goal (e.g. Tetris). Puzzles usually involve solving rather simple problems. Problem solving games generally test a players awareness of patterns and/ or short term memory.  Language generated tends to be isolated to individual language items such as object vocabulary, instructions and prepositions.  Puzzle games include spookymatch or Orbox.  They are great games to play as a reward for good work or behaviour as they are generally over very quickly or can be paused and returned to later.

5 Strategy Games

This is a game in which the gamer is presented with a number of possible choices in game play which will effect how they progress in the game. Try the games stop disasters, 3rd world farmer or Age of Empires.  The first two provide a context for some interesting discussions when used in a classroom while the last one takes place over a longer time frame and provides writing practice and an opportunity for learners to report on the game and progress in class time.

6 Adventure Games

Adventure games are a sub genre of point and click games but usually differ in that the game has got strong narrative elements.  There is usually a central character, a storyline, objectives to be achieved, an enemy and an outcome at the end.  Games covered in this genre on this blog include Morningstar (a sci-fi story), The Miller Estate (a spooky mystery), Hetherdale ( a jungle adventure) and Avalon (a fantasy text based adventure game) to name just four.

7 Casual Games

These games are aimed at a mass audience of people who tend to play games on a casual basis.  These games have been brought into the news recently with their rise in popularity on social network sites such as facebook.  Games such as farmville, mafia wars, scrabble like game, word games and puzzles can all be included in this genre.  Why not ask your learners if they play any and if they play any in common then get them to describe and compare their game playing.  Here’s a list of 10 casual games on facebook.

8 Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs)

Is a computer role playing genre in which a massive number of players interact with one another within a fictional virtual world.  The player assumes the role and takes control of the actions of a fictional character.  There are a lot of MMORPGs out there but one we have looked at already on this blog is Astro Empires.  The most famous MMORPG is probably World of Warcraft.

9 Alternate Reality Games

Sometimes abbreviated to an ARG.  These games consist of an interactive narrative that is based in the real world.  Typically they often use multiple media and game elements, to establish a narrative that the gamer can affect by either contributing ideas or taking actions.  Two ARGs we’ve already looked at on this blog were Smokescreen and Urgent Evoke.  We have also done a spotlight on ARG developer Jane McGonigal.

10 Virtual Worlds

This is a computer based simulated environment which has a strong online community element.  A virtual world such as second life has generated a lot of interest in education.   Here is a post we did on a Robin Hood learning Quest in Second Life.

1 Escape The Room Games

A lot of the escape games here take place in rooms within a house and so target a lot of vocabulary sets associated with furniture and household objects.  You can find walkthroughs for a lot of the games here by typing in:

“the name of the game” +walkthrough

in an online search engine.

Choose a fairly simple game for your learners to play. They can also open a word document and write down the instructions on how to complete the game.

2. Casual Girl Gamer

This is a blog that describes, reviews and links to free online games.  There are also articles about game developers.  This is a great site for finding not only fun games but also a great source for reading material.  Get learners to design their own scan reading activity.  Here are just three questions as an example:

What do you have to gain control of in ‘My little army’? (Myth balls)

How much does the Nintendo 3DS cost?($249 / £220)

Which Platformer game mentions a dessert? (Robot wants ice cream)

3. Jay Is Games

A nice website offering lots of different online games to play online and download.  Again lots of language in each games review for learners to read and extract gaming vocabulary, adjectives or just language they find interesting.  Use the navigation bar at the top to find your way around – don’t forget to bookmark the games you really like.

4. Daily Dress Up

A website dedicated to all manner of dress up games.  It’s also a great springboard to other sites if you can get round to checking out some of the links running down the left hand side.  Play one yourself and write the description for your learners to read and reproduce in the game.  Alternatively learners make their own, write a physical description, daily routines or a short story.

5.  Social Impact Games

If you would like to use games that aim to educate as well as entertain then this site is as good as any as a place to start looking.  We’ve posted a few of the games you’ll find here on the Digital Play blog (such as Third World Farmer) and no doubt continue to do so.  Using games with a real world message behind them are great for extracting vocabulary and then using as a discussion platform.

6. ks3Bitesize

The BBC are aiming games at schools here and many of them cover subjects such as English, maths and science.  The nice thing about this ks3 Bitesize is that you can be sure that both the site and the game content is young learner friendly.  Check them out and you may be in for a pleasant surprise.

7.  Gamershood

One of the earliest gaming websites I started using to find games to use in the classroom.  There’s certainly a lot of choice here and the games have been conveniently organised into genres such as room escape, point and click, adventure and over a dozen more.  There’s even a star rating for each so you can see before hand which are the most popular and the most fun.

8. Free Online GamesI’ve just looked up ‘online games’ on a search engine and this came up as the first link.  On first appearances it looks like there are a lot of games just calling for quick reflexes and not a lot of language but if you look a little further you’ll find a lot more games using the tags running down the right hand side of the page.  Interestingly enough I had this page up on an IWB and got quite a lot of language production from learners talking about what they could see, predicting the game content, discussing what kind of games they liked and so on.

9. Minijuegos

Unless you speak spanish or Italian then I wouldn’t go here as this site doesn’t have an English language option.  Why is it here then?  Well, you have to remember that for all the online searching you do you are probably forgetting your most valuable online tool – your learners.  If they play any online games then find out what they like (speaking practice) and maybe write a description down of what they’d like to see in class (writing).  You can tell them yourself what games you prefer to use (listening) and maybe even write a description down for them to take away with (reading) and find.  Get them to adapt a walkthrough to a game they like and bring it in to use in a future class.

10. Whitestick

A no frills website specialising in online text adventures.  There might be very little in the way of graphics but what is lacking in visuals in the selection here is more than made up for.  In text adventures the gamer reads the story and interacts with the narrative by typing in text commands.  There’s even a text to speech converter you can download so that the written text gets converted into spoken text.  Reading or listening practice – it’s your choice!

Location: Computer room

Language Focus: Receptive - There is/ are, prepositions of place.  Productive – Short answers (Yes, I can/have etc)

Game: Escape the Plush room

Situation

My class was pretty proficient with most of language structures I used within the live listening dictation I scripted for this activity (including prepositions of place, furniture vocabulary and answering questions).  They were however having problems producing short answers using the auxiliary verb which I wanted to work on.  Ok, a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ is usually sufficient to convey what is intended but not only was the course book we were using hammering the point home with some repetitive drilling activities, it’s also a nice foundation stone for later language development especially in an area primary English language learners sometimes have difficulties in – auxiliary verbs.  A class of sixteen learners works out nicely as two to a computer (our computer room has eight computer stations).

Target

This escape the room game posed a nice opportunity for a more fun and seemingly natural context to practice short answers while being embedded in other language elements and in a functional interaction.  Functional being dictating to the learners how to escape from a room in an online video game.  I wanted my learners to be able to listen, understand and successfully use what I was dictating to navigate their way through the game.  They would also be required to respond to any of my questions by forming short answers (yes/ no + subject (I) + auxiliary verb (n’t).  I hoped that any problems arising within the game and subsequent interactions would be driven by learner goals within the game.  that is to play it successfully to the end.

Action

The following text below is the script for the interaction that took place between myself and my learners.  I graded the language to the level of my students and allowed myself to repeat an instruction or question if it was not heard or understood clearly.  Checking learner comprehension was easy as all the computer screens were clearly visible to me (they lined the three walls of the room).  Some ad libbing was necessary but generally minimal.  Sometimes, especially to elicit the short answer forms, I repeated and added tonal emphasis on the auxiliary verb which echoed some of the classwork activities we’d done.  Very occasionally I elicited L1 vocabulary to confirm comprehension but as the game is annotated and learners are able to see the objects the biggest problem I had with some of the vocabulary was low frequency of use in native interactions (last time I used the word screwdriver was probably to order a cocktail) or pronunciation.  I also tried as hard as possible to avoid using the word ‘click’ firstly, because it seems too much of a shortcut and secondly, the resolution not to use it generally generates a larger range of grammatical structures.  Reviewing the text I felt surprised at how much text they had to listen to and how much they had to understand to play the game successfully.  Needless to say they found the game very engaging and though they produced seemingly little language (their language production is marked in the script below in parenthesis, much like this sentence is) it was functional and, to be honest, more frequent than you are led to believe below.  A lot of language produced by learners in this activity I failed to record below.  There was the occasional “repeat, please”, the odd “can I go to the toilet, please?” and the outright strange “The door to the chicken?” (They meant kitchen which wasn’t right either).  They also pelted me with questions, calls for assistance and such which were filtered out in the script in the attempt to weave a more seamless garment.  Without further ado, here it is:

On the table there is a red book. Can you see it? (Yes, I can)
Open the red book.
On the fourth page in the book there is a fuse. Have you got it? (Yes, I have)
On the left of the room there are three cupboards.
Go and look at them.
Open the cupboard in the middle. Is it open? (Yes, it is)
Pick up the fuse inside. Have you got it? (Yes, I have)
Go back. Can you see all of the room? (Yes, I can)
On the left there is a table with a flower on. Go to it.
Move the lamp and pick up the fuse that is under it.
What’s in the vase under the flower? (a key). Pick up the key under the flower that is in the vase. (what is vase? How do you say vase in ___? )
The flower is in the vase. The vase is black.
Go back. Can you see all of the room? (Yes, I can)
Go to the television. Under the television there are three drawers.
Open the drawer in the middle. Take the fuse and the red screwdriver. “How do you say screwdriver in (L1)?”. Ok.
Go back. Can you see all of the room? (Yes, I can)
On the table in front of you there are some oranges. Look at the oranges. What is next to the oranges? (a knife) Pick the knife up and go back.
What is on the wall on the left next to the television? (a junction box)
Go to the junction box and use the red screwdriver to open the junction box. (What is screwdriver?).
You’ve got it. It’s red. It was in the drawer under the television. Have you got it? (Yes, I have?)
Is the junction box open? (Yes, it is)
Put the four fuses in the junction box. Have you done it? (Yes, I have)
Go back to the television. Open the drawer on the left. What is in there? (a CD).
Open the DVD player and put the CD in. What can you see on the television? (a number). Copy the number, please.
Now, look in the drawer on the right. What is in the drawer on the right. Under the television. (cutting plier)
Have you got it? (Yes, I have)
Go back. Can you see all of the room? (Yes, I can)
Can you see the three pictures on the wall? (Yes, I can).
Look behind the picture in the middle. What do you use to open the door behind the picture? (red screwdriver). Ok. Open it.
What’s inside? (A key). Can you take it? (No). CAN you take it? (No, I can’t)
Go back to the four fuses.
Use the cutting plier on the red, blue and yellow wires above the four fuses. Can you do that? (Yes, I can).
Now, go back to the key behind the picture. Can you take it now? (Yes, I can).
What was the number on the television? (number)
Can you see the safe between the television and the fuses? (what is safe?) It’s a secret compartment you put money and things in.
Can you see it? On the right of the fuses and up a little. Can you see it? (Yes, I can).
Put the number on the television there and open it.
Did you open it? (Yes, I did). What’s inside? (A brief case).
Can you open it? (No, I can’t). Click on the brief case. Can you open it? (Yes, I can).
Can you see a key? (No) CAN you see a key? (No, I can’t)
Use the knife to cut the briefcase. Can you see a key now? (Yes, I can).
Open the door with the key. (What door?) The door to the room.

Results

I was pleased but a little tired at the end of the activity.  It had been quite intensive and I had been on my toes reading the dictation, paraphrasing to their level, assisting on technical problems (“Teacher, my mouse doesn’t work!”, “That’s because you’re using the mouse track ball to throw at a classmate.”), class control and behaviour issues and keeping an eye on their game progress on the 8 computer screens.  Numerous other teacher multitasking skills were in play but I had felt it had been a very productive  class.  or do I meant receptive?

This works well as a live listening activity, but I recommend playing it first as a race to see who finishes first in the computer room. With the students in pairs, give out the walkthrough (unnumbered) and ask them to order it as they play. To make it harder, remove some of the information (such as the codes in number 16) or (even more devious) change some of the clues so they give wrong information and then later in the classroom, ask the students to rewrite the errors and deal with all vocabulary questions.

COMPLETE WALKTHROUGH:

The end!

Location: Computer room

Skills Focus: Live listening

Language Focus: It’s something you use to + verb / for + gerund

Game: Mystery of Time and Space (MOTAS)

This game was probably one of the first point-and-click games I used with a class and many consider it a classic ‘escape the room game’.  It has got over a hundred rooms in which you have to find objects, work out puzzles and escape from the room.  What’s nice about this game is that if you hover your mouse over the objects in a room it is annotated (see below).  This is worth pointing out to your learners at a very early stage.

The pre-gaming activity below orientates learners to the annotation function within MOTAS.   You need to do this in a connected classroom before moving to a computer room.

Preparation

Print off a copy of the MOTAS walkthrough (rooms 1-8) or use an electronic copy of the MOTAS walkthrough (rooms 1-21) or the MOTAS video walkthrough (rooms 1- 5) to ‘dictate’ the game play to your learners.

Pre-Play

1. Present the game to the class and show them the first room.
2. Tell them they have 2 minutes to write down the name of as many objects as possible that they can see on the screen (whether they may use dictionaries is up to you).
3. When they have finished ask them to swap lists with another group.
4. Tell them that they get 2 points if the name of the object appears on the screen and 1 point if you accept it.
5. Move your cursor over each object on the screen.  Learners give 2 points if the object name appears.
6. Add up the marks and hand the list back to the original group.
7. Groups can now argue over the 1 point score words on their list e.g. ‘Locker’ is annotated but you can give 1 point if they say ‘cupboard’

Play

1. In a computer room tell learners they have to listen to you tell them how to escape.  The first one out the room and says stop gets 1 point.
2. They have to either find the annotation to find an object or ask you to describe the object to them e.g. Learner: “What’s a pillow?” Teacher: “You use it to put your head on when you go to sleep.”
3. Use a copy of the walkthrough or the video walkthrough to dictate to your learners how they should complete the game.

Post Play

As learners to write down some of the objects they remember from the game and to write a definition for the objects using the grammar:

It’s an object you use to + bare infinitive

It’s an object you use for + gerund

Alternative activity

Instead of doing a live listening activity or gaming dictation you could give learners a reading in which they have to sequence jumbled walkthrough sentences by playing the game in the computer room.

If you would like to try this why not download a copy of the MOTAS Sequencing Activity and make enough copies for each group in your computer room.

Level: Intermediate+

Topic: Kitchen vocabulary

Speaking Focus: Describing things in a kitchen

Time: 30 minutes

Game: The Great Kitchen Escape

The Great kitchen escape game is a great ‘ecape the room’ game which comes with a video walkthrough on youtube.

Key Language:kettle, cupboard, mixer, beater, radio, dial, batteries, fridge,  freezer, power cord, bowl, parrot, feather, tickle, dog collar, sink, fill up, switch on, plug it in, pour, knife, hammer, drill

Preparation

In the computer room decide which computers will have the video and which the game.  This can either be side by side or one side of the room the game and the other side the video walkthrough.

There is also some key vocabulary that will either have to be pre-taught or dealt with reactively when the playing activity is in progress.

Playing

Tell  learners that they will do this activity in pairs.  One  watches the video (they can use pause when they want and rewind) and relays how to complete the game to their partner . The learner playing the game can ask their partner, who is watching the video, any questions they like about the instructions he is giving (in English of course) This may be to clarify, repeat or make sure they have understood. After a few minutes the learner watching the video swaps places with their partner playing the game.

Post playing

For homework learners watch the video and write the walkthrough using the key language items.

Time: 30 minutes

Preparation: Just before the class goes into the computer room open up two internet explorer windows.  On one window get the game ‘Hamster rescue’ ready so it’s ready to start.  In the other window open up a copy of the annotated walkthrough. Be prepared to show the class the opening screenshot of the game (see below) either as a printed copy or by connecting online.

Game: Hamster rescue is a point-and-click game where you have to help the hamster escape from his cage.  Various objects on the screen need to be collected and sometimes combined in order for the hamster to escape.

Opening screenshot of the game ‘Hamster Rescue’

Pregaming activity

Show your learners the opening screenshot of the game ‘Hamster Rescue’ for 1 minute and then ask them to write down from memory a list of the things they saw.  Learners swap lists and then you show them the screenshot again.  Feedback on the items in the screenshot.  Learners give one point for each item on their partner’s list that is in the picture.  Cover any new vocabulary items.

Playing

In the computer room show your learners the walkthrough and tell them that this activity is a race.  In pairs they have to play the game using the walkthrough to help them complete the game as quickly as possible.  Point out that some of the words in the walkthrough are underlined and in blue:

If they don’t know what one of these underlined blue words mean they can click on it and see a picture of it.  For example if you click on the first annotated wor ‘paperclip’ you get this image:

The first pair to finish the game gets less homework.

Post Play

Tell your learners that foir homework they have to play a game.  Tell them they will have to use two windows like today – one to play the game and the other for the walkthrough.  Direct them to this page and ask them to play two of the other games.  The link to the game can be reached by clicking on the title and the walkthrough link is highlighted below the picture.  The pair that finished the game first and have less homework only have to play one of the other games.

The Game

You have to guide a robot through a number of different rooms, each of which require the solving of a puzzle. This is highly entertaining, but it is easy enough to do, so it’s not so obvious how you can use this for language learning…

Adapting the game

One idea would be to play the game in a whole-class situation and ask the students to guess what has to be done to pass the robot to the next room – there could be two teams and points awarded for the team which guesses correctly the right way to get the robot to the next room.

Another team-game way of using Gateway could be to award each team a number of seconds (accumulated for answering questions) – they ‘spend’ the seconds trying to get the robot through the door, winning points for each door they pass the robot through.

More Information

Read more about Gateway here / read the walkthrough

The game’s puzzles are easy until you get to the TV at level 9 (see image above), which requires more thought to solve (answer = the sequence on the TV monitors shows the numbers you need to press on the keypad to let you out the door = 95271)

There is a sequel, which continues the story, Gateway II - this continues with the story, but involves a lot of text that would be quite difficult for all but higher levels. See walkthrough here