Physical and Digital Educational Escape Room for Chemical Education

Abstract

An educational escape room uses a game-based active learning approach to develop students’ critical thinking and problem-solving skills in an immersive environment. In this chapter, the authors conducted an evaluation of two physical and digital educational escape rooms that were previously developed to provide an innovative learning activity to reinforce concepts and/or address misconceptions in chemistry for general chemistry courses. The evaluation demonstrated that both educational escape rooms are highly effective as teaching tools. Students’ provided positive feedback, highlighting that the educational escape rooms reinforce and motivate learning. Hence, integrating educational escape rooms with conventional lessons can offer students a holistic and captivating learning experience.

1. Introduction

Students often find chemistry challenging as they perceive it as abstract and content-heavy [1, 2]. As a result, students often resort to memorizing the content [3]. To increase engagement and motivation and to reinforce knowledge, an escape room could be used as a game-based active learning approach [4]. Educational escape rooms (EERs) have gained interest and popularity in various fields including science education in recent years [5, 6, 7]. EERs challenge students to apply conceptual knowledge to solve puzzles and complete tasks through a hands-on, interactive, and immersive experience. EERs have also been reported to enhance student engagement and soft skills, such as problem-solving and critical thinking skills [4, 8, 9].

Physical EERs are designed to be played in a physical space, such as a classroom or dedicated facility. They often incorporate props, puzzles, and challenges that require physical interaction and manipulation in a highly immersive and interactive environment. Digital EERs are designed to be played online or through a digital platform. They often use multimedia elements, such as videos, images, and audio, to create an immersive experience.

The unique and immersive experience in physical EERs can be difficult to replicate in a digital format. They allow for more flexibility in the design of puzzles and challenges to promote collaboration and communication skills. Digital EERs, on the other hand, allow for more flexibility in terms of accessibility and convenience, can be accessed asynchronously (anywhere and anytime) and allow teachers to track student progress. While both physical and digital EERs have their benefits, the choice between physical and digital EERs will depend on the specific needs and preferences of the teacher and students.

Game-based learning is a pedagogical approach that engages students in active and experiential learning [10]. This approach draws on the principles of game design and applies them to educational contexts to promote students’ motivation, engagement, and learning outcomes [11]. The self-determination theory [12] and the cognitive load theory [13], provide the basis for the design and development of game-based learning environments [14, 15]. These frameworks address motivation, engagement, and cognitive processing issues and ensure that games enacted as learning activities align with educational goals and objectives. Game-based learning offers a unique perspective on designing and implementing effective teaching and learning strategies by lowering students’ cognitive load [16].

The benefits associated with EERs made them a suitable teaching tool in chemical education. EERs have been increasingly used in chemical education [17, 18, 19, 20, 21] to promote student engagement [22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29]. Although numerous accounts exist regarding the utilization of EER in chemical education and its positive impact on student engagement, there is a dearth of studies focusing on its effectiveness in terms of academic achievement, particularly ones that rely on objective data rather than students’ self-reports. This chapter focuses on the evaluation of the effectiveness of two previously developed physical and digital EERs for chemical education, which draws on the principles of game-based learning [30, 31]. In addition, students’ perceptions of both the physical and digital EERs were compared. This chapter aims to contribute to the use of EERs as a worthwhile teaching tool for science education, specifically in the field of chemistry.

2. Results and discussion

A mixed-method approach was used to evaluate both EERs. The evaluation included students’ achievement of learning outcomes using pre- and post-tests and their perception of EERs through a survey.

2.1 Educational escape room for the topic of chemical bonding

The design and implementation of the physical and digital EER were reported previously [31]. A quasi-experiment was conducted with students from the Diploma in Pharmaceutical Science and Diploma in Food Science & Nutrition at Nanyang Polytechnic (NYP) across the academic years (AY) 2019 and 2020. In this study, participants completed a pre- and post-test and the difference in scores between the pre- and post-test was used to determine the effectiveness of the intervention. Students’ perceptions of the interventions were determined through an anonymous survey.

A class with approximately 24 students were randomly split into three groups (groups A, B and C) of approximately 6 to 8 students (Figure 1). Before engaging in the intervention as a learning activity, all students took a pre-test. Groups A and B were exposed to different interventions: Group A received a typical tutorial worksheet, while Group B experience the physical EER. The purpose was to evaluate the effectiveness of the interventions in learning the topic of chemical bonding. Group C, on the other hand, experienced both the tutorial worksheet and physical EER before taking the post-test. Immediately after completing the post-test, all students filled out an online survey. Following the survey, Groups A and B underwent the other intervention to ensure equal learning experiences for all students. At the end of the 2-hour lesson, students were provided with feedback on their test answers and were given an overview of the study.

Figure 1.

The research design for the chemical bonding EER study.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the implementation of the physical EER was not feasible. Hence, in AY 2020, a digital EER was developed as an alternative to the physical EER. Although the digital could be completed individually or in groups, in this study, students completed the digital EER in groups of four via a video conferencing platform. For this group of students (group D), the research design was similar to group B, except that the physical EER was replaced with a digital EER (Figure 1) and the group size was smaller.

Table 1 shows the mean scores of the pre- and post-test in each group. All interventions showed a gain in the mean scores, indicating that students’ academic achievement for this topic increased. Students who experienced the physical EER (group B) showed the greatest improvement (34.8%). Students who experienced the digital EER (group D) showed a lower percentage increase (27.5%). This could be attributed to the distanced learning experience and the increased transactional distance [32] among the students, teachers and their peers. It is worth noting that students who experienced both the worksheet and physical EER (group C) had a lower percentage increase (27.4%) compared to physical EER alone. This could be because students were cognitively fatigued after completing two interventions [33].

Group	A (N = 44)	B (N = 44)	C (N = 41)	D (N = 61)
Pre-test mean score; (max score = 10)	5.02	6.00	5.44	6.52
Post-test mean score; (max score = 10)	6.18	8.09	6.93	8.31
Percentage increase	23.1	34.8	27.4	27.5

Table 1.

Pre-and post-test mean scores for chemical bonding EER.

All students completed a survey after the post-test, and the survey results were summarized in Tables 2 and 3. The survey used a four-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = agree, 4 = strongly agree). The survey items (Table A1) consist of five subscales: Interest/enjoyment, perceived competency, value/usefulness, relatedness, and extrinsic motivation adapted from the Intrinsic Motivational inventory [34] and Extrinsic Incentives [35] and modified according to the type of intervention. Table 2 shows the mean scores for the individual items and Table 3 shows the mean scores for the subscales. As the tests and the survey were conducted on different platforms, some students chose to participate in either the tests and/or the survey, leading to the different sample size. As expected, the results for the worksheet group (group A) were low and the results for the physical EER were the highest. It is interesting to note that students’ perceptions of the worksheet and digital EER were similar. Despite the lower percentage increase in academic achievement for group C, students’ perception was similar to group B. Hence, students were still motivated to complete the physical EER after the worksheet, but two back-to-back learning activities resulted in cognitive fatigue [33].

Subscales	Items	Group A (N = 56)	Group B (N = 53)	Group C (N = 21)	Group D (N = 53)
		Item mean (SD)
Interest/ Enjoyment	1	2.50 (0.76)	3.53 (0.54)	3.38 (0.50)	2.70 (0.85)
	2	2.66 (0.84)	3.53 (0.64)	3.52 (0.60)	2.96 (0.81)
	3*	2.61 (0.95)	1.49 (0.70)	1.71 (0.78)	2.17 (0.89)
	4	2.59 (0.91)	3.47 (0.64)	3.38 (0.50)	2.58 (0.80)
	5	2.66 (0.82)	3.42 (0.63)	3.33 (0.58)	2.57 (0.80)
Perceived competence	6	2.18 (0.88)	2.34 (0.78)	2.33 (0.97)	2.17 (0.73)
	7	2.27 (0.75)	2.51 (0.75)	2.62 (0.74)	2.21 (0.74)
	8*	2.68 (0.86)	1.92 (0.83)	2.19 (0.75)	2.47 (0.80)
Value/ Usefulness	9	2.57 (0.85)	3.32 (0.73)	3.43 (0.60)	2.40 (0.84)
	10	2.98 (0.70)	3.71 (0.75)	2.95 (0.74)	2.70 (0.85)
	11	3.09 (0.67)	3.13 (0.73)	3.19 (0.68)	2.64 (0.79)
Relatedness	12	2.79 (0.82)	3.23 (0.67)	3.33 (0.58)	2.49 (0.75)
	13*	1.89 (0.89)	1.51 (0.70)	1.67 (0.97)	1.81 (0.74)
	14	3.07 (0.74)	3.47 (0.61)	3.43 (0.60)	2.70 (0.70)
	15	2.89 (0.85)	3.42 (0.63)	3.52 (0.60)	2.62 (0.90)
Extrinsic motivation	16	2.71 (0.65)	2.96 (0.73)	2.76 (0.77)	2.51 (0.80)
	17	2.55 (0.83)	2.55 (0.93)	2.24 (0.94)	2.00 (0.85)
	18	2.95 (0.75)	2.96 (0.85)	2.62 (1.02)	2.28 (0.79)

Table 2.

Descriptive statistics of students’ perception of the learning activities (tutorial worksheet, physical EER, and/or digital EER) based on individual items.

*

Reverse question, item mean was reversed before calculating the subscale mean in Table 3. This is to measure the same construct as the other questions, but are phrased in an opposite manner to detect and control for response bias.

Subscales	Group A (N = 56)	Group B (N = 53)	Group C (N = 21)	Group D (N = 53)
	Subscale mean (SD)
Interest/ Enjoyment	2.56 (0.86)	3.49 (0.63)	3.38 (0.59)	2.73 (0.83)
Perceived competence	2.26 (0.83)	2.64 (0.79)	2.59 (0.82)	2.30 (0.76)
Value/ Usefulness	2.88 (0.74)	3.39 (0.74)	3.19 (0.67)	2.58 (0.83)
Relatedness	2.97 (0.83)	3.40 (0.65)	3.40 (0.69)	2.75 (0.77)
Extrinsic motivation	2.74 (0.74)	2.82 (0.84)	2.54 (0.91)	2.26 (0.81)

Table 3.

Mean scores of each survey subscale for all groups of students.

The mean scores of reverse questions (i.e. those marked with an asterisk in Table 2) were reversed before calculating the subscales’ mean scores.

In the survey, students were also asked qualitative questions to triangulate the quantitative data. Based on their responses, students felt that they were able to apply what they have learnt by solving the puzzles in a fun and exciting environment. It also allowed them to work with one another to solve the puzzles which is an enjoyable and memorable experience. On the other hand, the digital EER has posed challenges such as communication with their peers and the lack of interactivity due to the remote nature of the digital EER. However, students still felt that digital EER was effective in general.

2.2 Educational escape room for general chemistry topics

Following the development and implementation of the chemical bonding EER, an EER for general chemistry topics was also developed. The design and implementation of the digital EER for stoichiometry were reported previously [30]. A quasi-experiment was conducted with 38 students from the Polytechnic Foundation Program (PFP) under the Applied & Health Sciences cluster in NYP who participated in this study. Similar to the first study, pre- and post-tests were administered to determine the effectiveness of the intervention in addressing misconception. The effectiveness was measured through the increase in academic performance (mean score) for the relevant topic. Students’ perception of the digital EER was determined through an anonymous survey.

The participants formed three groups with the first group as the control with no intervention, the second group went through an online synchronous lesson, while the third group experienced the digital EER (Figure 2). To ensure all participants had the same learning experience, students underwent the other interventions before completing the survey.

Figure 2.

The research design for the stoichiometry EER study.

Four topics in general chemistry (balancing chemical equations, calculating empirical formulae identifying the types of chemical bonding and interpreting element symbols) were included in the pre-test. Based on the mean scores, it was clear that students found determining empirical formulae challenging (Table 4).

Topic	Balancing chemical equations	Determining empirical formulas	Identifying the types of chemical bonding	Interpreting element symbols
Mean score; (N = 38, max score = 10)	8.95	6.05	9.58	8.97

Table 4.

Pre-test mean scores for each of the general chemistry topics.

Upon analyzing the pre-test responses of students, it was found out that students have misconceptions in determining the empirical formulae. This conceptual error has led to a low score in that specific topic. According to Chi [36], a concept has both perceptual features and conceptual attributes and can be viewed as belonging to the explanation-based or principle-based categories. To address the misconception, students must undergo the process of conceptual change, where an existing conception is replaced with a new conception. Kuhn [37] developed the Kuhn cycle for conceptual change which ends with a paradigm change where a new reality can be explained by a new paradigm. Conceptual change also draws from Piaget’s concepts of assimilation and accommodation which are situated in Piaget’s learning theory of cognitivism [38]. In addition, the social and/or affective dimension has also been reported as part of the multidimensional framework for conceptual change [39]. This framework further supports the learner-centred collaborative learning feature found in most EERs.

The study focused on the topic of determining empirical formulae to evaluate the effectiveness of using digital EER in addressing misconceptions and facilitating effective conceptual change. After the pre-test was administered, group 1 was assigned as the control group due to their higher pre-test mean scores for the determining empirical formulae topic. Groups 2 and 3 were randomly assigned to either intervention. The students then took a post-test. The mean pre- and post-test scores for the topic of determining empirical formulae showed that for both groups 2 and 3, there is an approximate 10% increase in the mean scores (Table 5). This result is not surprising because intuitively having some form of intervention is more beneficial than no intervention. Comparing a typical synchronous online lesson (group 2) to digital EER (group 3), the digital EER group had a slightly higher percentage increase in their mean scores. With this, it can be concluded that the digital EER is as effective, if not better, than a typical synchronous online lesson in addressing misconceptions.

Group	1 (N = 11)	2 (N = 10)	3 (N = 17)
Pre-test mean score; (max score = 10)	7.27	5.50	5.59
Post-test mean score; (max score = 10)	7.27	6.00	6.18
Percentage increase	0	9.1	10.6

Table 5.

Pre- and post-test mean scores for determining empirical formulae topic.

Besides the slightly higher percentage increase in the mean score for digital EER, students also had a better perception of the digital EER as a teaching tool over the typical synchronous online lesson. The survey used a four-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = agree, 4 = strongly agree). The results of the survey showed that students found the digital EER more interesting compared to a typical synchronous online lesson (Table 6). They were also willing to participate more actively as they were more motivated. Besides the increase in academic performance, students also reported additional benefits such as increased teamwork and the development of innovation competency.

Subscale	Item	Item mean; (SD)	Subscale mean (SD)
Motivation/Interest	I enjoy participating in the escape room.	3.42 (0.68)	3.36 (0.72)
	I find the digital escape room more interesting.	3.42 (0.76)
	I participate more actively in the digital escape room.	3.39 (0.68)
	I feel more motivated when participating in the digital escape room.	3.21 (0.74)
Teamwork	The escape room promotes teamwork.	3.66 (0.63)	3.66 (0.63)
Innovation competency	I develop and experiment with new ways of problem solving when participating in the escape room.	3.16 (0.89)	3.19 (0.86)
	I use trial and error for problem solving when participating in the escape room.	3.24 (0.85)
	I think differently and adopt different perspectives when participating in the escape room.	3.18 (0.83)

Table 6.

Descriptive statistics of students’ (N = 38) perception of the digital EER compared to a typical synchronous online lesson.

In the survey, students were also asked to qualitatively indicate what they liked about the digital EER. Students enjoyed the freedom when completing the digital EER. This could be attributed to the open structure of the EER where students could solve the tasks with no restrictions in terms of the order. Students also liked that the digital EER could promote teamwork, and was fun, interesting, and engaging. This aligned with the quantitative data where the mean scores for motivation/interest and teamwork subscales were high (3.36 and 3.66 respectively).

3. Limitations

While the existing research highlights the potential benefits of EERs in chemical education, it is important to acknowledge and address various challenges and limitations. One significant challenge is the time and resource constraints, particularly when it comes to physical EERs. The development and maintenance of physical resources, such as laboratory setups or interactive models, often require substantial investments of time, effort, and funding. Educators must carefully consider these limitations and assess the feasibility of implementing such resources within their specific educational context.

Another challenge lies in the design of appropriate tasks that effectively leverage the potential of EERs and align with the learning objectives. Tasks should be thoughtfully crafted to encourage active participation, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills among students. Ensuring that the tasks are engaging, meaningful, and directly relevant to the learning goals can significantly impact the effectiveness of EERs in facilitating conceptual understanding and knowledge retention.

Additionally, catering to the diverse needs of students is essential to foster inclusive learning experiences. EERs should be designed with flexibility and accessibility in mind, allowing for adaptations to accommodate different learning styles, abilities, and preferences. Considering the diverse backgrounds and abilities of students promotes a more inclusive educational environment and ensures equitable opportunities for all learners.

Furthermore, the topics covered in this study were not exhaustive, as the focus was primarily on general chemistry. Exploring additional topics from different areas of chemistry would provide a more comprehensive understanding of the impact of EERs across the discipline. In addition, the smaller sample size, especially in our second study, could potentially affect the generalizability of the findings. To enhance the reliability and validity of future research, expanding the study to include a larger group of students would be beneficial. This would allow for a more representative sample, thus increasing the generalizability of the study’s results.

4. Conclusions

In conclusion, both pieces of research on physical and digital EERs in chemistry courses highlight the effectiveness of game-based learning approaches in education. The physical EER for chemical bonding successfully facilitated critical thinking and problem-solving skills, encouraged discussion, and promoted collaborative problem-solving. While the physical EER was modified into a digital format due to the COVID-19 pandemic, student feedback affirmed the value of both approaches in reinforcing learning. Furthermore, the digital EER for stoichiometry not only proves to be as effective as traditional online lessons with collaborative learning methods in addressing misconceptions but also offers the additional advantages of fostering teamwork, time management skills, communication abilities, innovation competency, and student motivation. Therefore, incorporating EERs alongside traditional lessons can provide students with a comprehensive and engaging learning experience in immersive environments.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the School of Applied Science at Nanyang Polytechnic for supporting both studies, the development and implementation of both EERs and the publication of this chapter.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Appendix

Subscales	Item; No.	Survey Items; (Group A)	Survey Items; (Group B, C and D)
Interest/ Enjoyment	1	I would describe doing the worksheet as very interesting.	I would describe this escape room as very interesting.
	2	Doing the worksheet was an interesting way to learn.	Playing the escape room was an interesting way to learn.
	3	Doing the worksheet was a boring activity.*	Playing the escape room was a boring activity.*
	4	Doing the worksheet was fun.	Playing the escape room was fun.
	5	Doing the worksheet was quite enjoyable.	Playing the escape room was quite enjoyable.
Perceived competence	6	I do the worksheet well compared to other students.	I play well in the escape room compared to other students.
	7	I was quite good at doing the worksheet.	I was quite good at playing the escape room.
	8	I was unable to do the worksheet well.*	I was unable to play the escape room well.*
Value/ Usefulness	9	I would be willing to do the worksheet again because it was valuable to me.	I would be willing to play the escape room again because it was valuable to me.
	10	I believed I learnt about the topic while I was doing the worksheet.	I believed I learnt about the topic while I was playing the escape room.
	11	I believed doing the worksheet was beneficial to me.	I believed playing the escape room was beneficial to me.
Relatedness	12	I felt close with my peers while doing the worksheet.	I felt close with my peers while playing the escape room.
	13	I did not feel like I could really trust my peers in doing the worksheet.*	I did not feel like I could really trust my peers in playing the escape room.*
	14	I like to do the worksheet with my peers because we could achieve something together.	I like to play the escape room with my peers because we could achieve something together.
	15	Doing the worksheet provided more chances to interact with my peers.	Playing the escape room provided more chances to interact with my peers.
Extrinsic motivation	16	Doing the worksheet helped me to improve my grade.	Playing the escape room helped me to improve my grade.
	17	I want others to know that I am a good student if I do the worksheet well.	I want others to know that I am a good student if I play the escape room well.
	18	I want to do the worksheet well so that my effort will be recognized by my classmates.	I want to play this escape room well so that my effort will be recognized by my classmates.

Table A1.

Survey items for chemical bonding EER.

^*

Reverse questions to measure the same construct as the other questions, but are phrased in an opposite manner to detect and control for response bias.