In-person and online escape rooms for individual and team-based learning in health professions library instruction

Abstract

Background: A growing body of research demonstrates that adapting the popular entertainment activity “escape rooms” for educational purposes as an innovative teaching method can improve the learning experience. Escape rooms promote teamwork, encourage analytical thinking, and improve problem solving. Despite the increasing development and use of escape rooms in health sciences programs and academic libraries, there is little literature on the use of this method in health sciences libraries with health professions students.Case Presentation: Staff at a health sciences library collaborated with faculty to incorporate escape rooms into library instruction in a variety of formats (in-person, hybrid, online) with health professions students from various disciplines (optometry, pharmacy, medicine). The escape rooms described in this paper offered unique experiences for students through active learning.Discussion: Important considerations when planning escape rooms for health sciences library instruction include deciding on team-based or individual design, calculating potential costs in time and money, deciding on an in-person, hybrid, or online format, and determining whether grades should be assigned. Escape rooms can be an effective strategy for library instruction in the health sciences, working in multiple formats to bring game-based learning to a variety of health professions students.

Team- and Problem-Based Learning in Health Services: A Systematic Literature Review of Recent Initiatives in the United States

“…Students report feeling more engaged and having higher satisfaction when active learning is included in their education [33]. Further, students are more equipped to both educate others and delegate work, mimicking real-world workplaces that require working on teams and solving analytical problems with others [20,21].…”

“…Online active learning often uses case-study review, but it also includes procedural reviews, escape rooms (for problem solving and use of constructivism), and self and group reflection [20,21,33,34,36,54]. Using a multi-modal discussion to brainstorm ahead of active learning and debrief after can help the online environment to feel more effective and connected, and it can be key to engagement [20].…”

“…The literature suggests that some components of working in an online environment can be cost effective, depending on the level of engagement between the faculty and the student [20,21,33]. A reduction in effort with each iteration of a project may occur if there are not significant changes as well as an inverse relationship with the ability to scale to larger groups over time [20,21,33].…”

“…The literature suggests that some components of working in an online environment can be cost effective, depending on the level of engagement between the faculty and the student [20,21,33]. A reduction in effort with each iteration of a project may occur if there are not significant changes as well as an inverse relationship with the ability to scale to larger groups over time [20,21,33]. The setup and organization of a project can positively or negatively impact engagement but requires proper planning upfront and purposeful goal setting to reduce costs and the need for a large number of staff to manage the project [21].…”

“…A reduction in effort with each iteration of a project may occur if there are not significant changes as well as an inverse relationship with the ability to scale to larger groups over time [20,21,33]. The setup and organization of a project can positively or negatively impact engagement but requires proper planning upfront and purposeful goal setting to reduce costs and the need for a large number of staff to manage the project [21]. And, if the time is spent upfront, subsequent offerings of the same project have been noted to be at a reduced expense-both in time and resources [20].…”