Novice to Leader: My Beginner Journey to Designing Escape Rooms

Abstract

Playful learning practices are recognised in higher education as they align with active learning pedagogies. They promote innovation and leadership that influence and inspire educators. An escape room is one such playful learning practice. Among educators, it is commonly identified as a game that is designed mostly by experts. However, this paper presents work by a learning designer with no prior knowledge of designing escape rooms, yet is an enthusiastic learner who wants to inspire the higher education community. The work reflects on the design journey acquired from novice to leader level. Three escape rooms were designed to reflect on the experience. Two of the escape rooms were digital, and the other was in physical space. The paper interprets the experiences and informal feedback from colleagues captured during the design and facilitation of these escape rooms. The reflections indicated that taking the initiative to design and facilitate escape rooms promoted playful learning pedagogy and leadership. Distributed and transformational leadership were visible throughout the journey. This work is situated within educational escape rooms, playful learning and leadership theories. The findings highlighted that the foundation of leadership in playful innovations is being transparent about experiences gained along the journey and encouraging other educators to start with smaller and simple steps. In this way, the community can be inspired to recognise that playful pedagogical innovations are not limited to experts and experienced educators. This inspiration brings the community together, opening avenues for collaboration and co-creation to promote them as leaders in the innovative learning design process. Even though the findings cannot be generalised across all contexts, the paper shares the experience of a novice designer of escape rooms in building community knowledge through pedagogical innovation and leadership.