Do it Yourself: Design your own escape room for the children's room
Escape rooms, or so-called escape games, have been a big hit for some time now - even for children. This year, the Stadtbibliothek Bremen is offering four entertaining, fast-paced escape games as part of the 53° summer holiday program. However, with a little imagination and preparation time, the puzzle fun can easily be implemented in your own four walls and is THE new board game for the whole family!
What is it about and what do you have to pay attention to when planning?
An exciting story, tricky tasks and secrets that have to be solved with patience, skill, imagination and logic are the basic recipe for designing an escape game. Karina Bothe, library education assistant at the Stadtbibliothek , advises planners to first think about a theme or a background story. This gives the game a common thread and the common goal unites the group. The better the teamwork, the greater the chance of escaping the room. In the planned game in Lesum, for example, the children are trapped in the library due to a mishap and have to free themselves - but this can only be achieved if tricky brainteasers are cracked together.
The size of the room also plays a role. “The room should not be too big, but not too small either,” says Bothe. In a small room the children would get in each other's way too much. In a large room it can quickly become too confusing. The room does not necessarily have to be lockable. Instead, the door can be secured with a chain or padlock. And if you don't have a lockable room, you can give up the search for treasure or something similar as your goal.
In the classic escape room, players often have between one and 1.5 hours to escape. For children, depending on their age, it is recommended to shorten the game time to around 30 minutes. Karina Bothe provides the children with a timer so that they have a good overview of the remaining time.
And which puzzles are suitable?
There are no limits to your imagination. Basically, Karina Bothe recommends integrating the puzzles into the background story of the escape game. For example, it could be exciting to find a blacklight flashlight as part of the game. The children could use it to decipher a secret code that was written down with a corresponding pen, according to the library education worker. A skill or obstacle course also adds variety to the game. “Variation and exciting puzzles are important so that the children stay on the ball,” says Bothe. Websites like Pinterest offer plenty of inspiration for brain teasers and guessing games. But you can also find one or two books on the topic in the Stadtbibliothek Bremen holdings. Karina Bothe recommends “Escape Home – a step-by-step guide” (authors: Jens Mekiska and Bastian Schenk) for your own escape room at home. However, there are also complete printed materials and instructions on the Internet, which you can usually download for a fee, she says.
If you want to solve digital puzzles with your children, Karina Bothe recommends the apps “Can you Escape” and “100 Doors”. The former is a classic escape game in which players have to escape from rooms. In “100 Doors” players have to open 100 different doors using puzzles. “You may have to shake the cell phone, turn it or hold it upside down,” says Bothe. Both apps can be used for iOS or Android devices.
usefull links
central library and in Vahr for our escape games as part of our summer holiday program .
>> You can find the recommended book “Escape Home” here in our media offering as an e-book or printed version.
>> You can find lots of tips and suggestions for the escape room in the children's room on Pinterest.
>> You can download the recommended app “Can you Escape” here in the App Store and here in the Google Playstore .