Here’s a quick guide for how to plan a fun escape room experience with your kids so everyone feels involved, happy, and emotionally connected.
Escape rooms have been growing in popularity nowadays. Aside from exciting themes and adventures, escape room games offer brain-thirsty puzzles, tricky clues, and riddles that can pique anyone’s interest and imagination.
What’s more exciting about escape rooms is that they are fun and thrilling for every age. It means even the young ones in the family can join and participate in solving challenging mysteries. This makes escape rooms a perfect bonding activity that families can explore.
I’m sharing these tips about escape rooms for parents and their kids for 2 reasons. Firstly, I’m a mom and our family loves escape rooms. Secondly, I’m a bestselling happiness book author with about 2 million books sold globally.
I’m also the founder of the therapist recommended online course: The Anxiety Cure.
I love sharing tips to help people to live their happiest lives. With this in mind, here’s my quick guide for planning a fun escape room time with your family!
Escape rooms are an interactive and challenging game that kids will surely enjoy. It can encourage young children to think outside the box and make crucial decisions, helping them develop their decision-making skills and critical thinking. Moreover, below are other reasons why escape rooms can also be great for children:
With escape rooms, learning can be more fun and exciting than ever. And if you want a one-of-a-kind escape room experience with your kids, you’re on the right page. This post will help you plan a game night your kids will never forget.
To help you get started, below are tips worth noting to help you plan a great escape room experience with your kids:
As you look for an escape room to try, you’d want to ensure it’s appropriate to your child’s age. Avoid escape rooms that promote themes unsuitable for young audiences as much as possible. These include destruction, violence, horror, and death (suicide, murder, etc.).
To give you ideas, here are some examples of themes you may look for in a kid-friendly escape room:
Aside from choosing age-appropriate themes, it can also help to consider escape rooms based on their wants or preferences. For example, a science-themed escape room filled with simple experiments is a no-brainer if your child loves science. Or, if they love mysteries, you can book an escape room wherein your kids can be a spy looking for clues and solving riddles.
Still can’t find an escape room suitable for your kids? You may visit Hour To Midnight Escape Rooms Portland to help you find the perfect theme your kids will enjoy.
Exploring new adventures with your kids is always fun and exciting. But it can still be helpful if you can talk to them and discuss what they can expect during the game.
For example, you can sit with them and explain what escape rooms are. You can also tell them how they should behave while inside the room. And since you already know the theme, you can excite them by describing what they will likely find inside the escape room.
In addition, you can also assure them there’s no right or wrong way to play, so they won’t feel pressured to finish the challenge. It’d also be best to discuss the game’s rules and other specifics (e.g., time limits, dos and don’ts).
Having a conversation with your kids beforehand can help reduce the anxiety they may be feeling. While this isn’t common, some kids may feel anxious or nervous trying out new things.
As much as escape rooms can be fun and interactive, and you want your kids to explore and try to solve the challenge on their own, it’s still important to guide them throughout the process. It’d be good to note that you are their teacher during the game who will help them navigate their way inside the room.
Aside from guiding and explaining what you’re playing, encourage your kids to participate and contribute answers to puzzles and riddles. And to make them feel involved and part of the team, you can delegate manageable tasks they can perform.
Here are some examples of tasks your kids can take on:
Fortunately, most kid-friendly escape rooms are free from complicated puzzles and riddles only adults can solve. This is why step one, or searching for age-appropriate escape rooms, is important.
In line with the previous tip, the key to solving riddles and winning an escape room is teamwork! So, encourage your kids to communicate and collaborate with other team members to figure out the answer to tricky and mind-boggling puzzles and riddles.
If your kids are having trouble finding a solution to the problem, remind them that they’re always welcome to ask for help, and nothing is embarrassing about that. Doing so can help them see and understand the importance of teamwork and understand the role everyone has in the game.
Moreover, if some aspects of the game are too complex for your kids, help them understand the clues and solve the puzzles. This can be a great way to make them feel important and part of the problem-solving process. If they can’t seem to understand something, explain what that thing is to them. Doing this can help them make the most of the game and value the importance of communication and collaboration.
Sometimes, kids may get frustrated or overwhelmed while playing the game. This can be expected because that’s how children are. However, it can help to know how to relieve their frustrations and keep them calm throughout the game.
To help you with this, it’s essential to remind them there’s nothing wrong with being unable to solve the challenge on the first try. It’s also good to help your kids understand that mistakes are a part of the game. After all, without making mistakes, there will be no opportunity to learn and explore new things.
Furthermore, encourage your kids to live in the moment and enjoy the experience. Besides the reward and the sense of accomplishment after completing the challenge, you want your kids to remember that solving puzzles and finding clues together has been a fantastic experience for them, creating family memories they’ll surely cherish.
Since an escape room is an interactive experience, allowing your kids to explore the room freely would be good. Let them move around and explore things on their own. They’ll be delighted with how detailed escape rooms can be regarding lighting, props, and other elements aligned with the theme. From touching objects and solving riddles to listening for clues, your kids will enjoy exploring everything independently.
So, let them satisfy their curiosity and quench their thirst for knowledge—no roughhousing as much as possible! And make sure to keep your eyes on them as they move around. They might become overwhelmed as they discover new things. If that’s the case, always be on guard and lend a hand whenever necessary.
After completing every puzzle and escaping the room, ensure to spare a few minutes and have a conversation with your kids. You can ask them about their experience while playing inside the room. For example, did they enjoy finding clues? Did they have fun answering tricky puzzles and riddles?
In addition, you can ask your kids what they like and dislike about the game and some suggestions or things they’d like to do next time. You can also take this opportunity to discuss some essential lessons they learned, such as the value of teamwork, proper communication, and critical thinking.
Every success has to be celebrated, no matter how big or small.
So, regardless if you successfully solved the challenges in the game and escaped the room, it’s still a great idea to spend time rewarding yourselves. Congratulate each other, especially your kids, for all their hard work and effort. This can be a good teaching moment wherein your young ones could understand that learning could also be a form of winning.
Lastly, remind them that what’s important is you had fun playing and solving puzzles together.
Escape rooms are not just fun and exciting; they’re also a great way to challenge your kids to solve tricky problems while also allowing them to learn valuable skills they can use growing up. These include critical thinking, decision-making, and teamwork.
Hopefully, the tips above can help you plan the best game night and make the most out of your bonding activity with your kids. And as you explore different escape room games, don’t forget to have fun and enjoy the experience!
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