Guest Blogger - Colleen Jiron

Breakout with Dewey!

Colleen Jiron, Teacher Librarian-Community Montessori Elementary

Fun Way to Reinforce Dewey

We revised an existing Breakout challenge from Breakout.edu to use in our Dewey Decimal Numbers and Library procedures lesson. These are lessons we cover every year, but I have to say, this was a much more creative and fun way to reinforce it, especially when followed up with an online game called "Order in the Library" which is free from UT Austin (students do NOT use their full names).


We had three rounds of combined 4th-5th graders and they loved it! The original Game is called Library Interview Breakout by Mia Beesley (please email me to access the password for this Breakout).

We Broke Out!

Two of the classes successfully solved all 4 of the puzzles and opened the Lockbox. The third group failed to solve the last puzzle, which is a lesson in coping with "failure." I gave everyone "prizes" for participation (those cool bookmarks from Demco that can be colored like personal mandalas), and the two successful classes also had their pictures taken with a large poster "WE BROKE OUT!". Some students commented that "this was the best lesson we ever did" and "we should do another one of these!"

Debrief and Reflect

We followed up with a debriefing discussion, with classes describing what they could have done differently or better. That was pretty interesting. Comments like "communicated better with all groups," and "remained on task instead of getting distracted," as well as "getting organized and reading everything before we started" were apropos and right on target.

For more detailed instructions, see the link above for the original Game by Ms. Beesley, and click HERE for my revised instructions."