A Calorimetry Experiment as an Escape Room-Style Game for High School Chemistry Students

This article describes the design, implementation, and critical evaluation of an escape room-style laboratory activity centered on calorimetry in a high school chemistry course. The activity places students in small teams and uses a narrative framework with sequential, lock-based challenges that incorporate principles of heat transfer, specific heat capacity, and mole relationships. Students progress through the activity by completing chemistry-related tasks, including guided calorimetry experiments and calculation-based challenges, to access subsequent clues. Classroom implementation revealed increased engagement and peer interaction, though performance on summative assessments related to calorimetry was comparable to that of previous years, suggesting that the primary impact of the activity was on engagement. Rather than presenting the activity as a fully optimized model, this work adopts a case-study approach that examines both student responses and design limitations. Reflection on this activity highlights key challenges in designing escape room laboratory experiments, including balancing experimental accuracy with game progression, ensuring puzzle accessibility, and incorporating sufficient variety in puzzle mechanics.