Goosechase: Try it TODAY!

Recently I came across the app called Goosechase.  It sets up a scavenger hunt via the website and an app.  It was really easy to create, and my students were able to easily figure out how to play as well.  The directions to set up the game are here.

I logged in and then I set up the game with a name and a password.  Then I started setting up the missions.  I stuck with the photo and video missions.  Students could choose for the most part, but sometimes I wanted actions, so I had them record a video.  You can also add in a text submission.  If you wanted to hide something somewhere with a message and have students write it back, this would be a possibility.  We were working on directions and city vocabulary, so I stuck with many of those words.  I would write a description of what they were supposed to do all in Spanish.  I wrote 14 missions, but students were finishing them faster than I thought.  I was able to add more missions in once the game started which was a nice feature.  I ended up with 24 missions and most of my students finished within 30 minutes.  You may want to aim higher if you want students to have extra questions.  It probably took me about 20 minutes to sign up to create the game and create all of the missions.  The app also provides suggestions which you could translate for students to your TL.

When students came into class, they split up into teams and used the directions under the team tab for how to join the game.  Again, this was pretty self explanatory.  My students only used one phone per group.  I did not see a way to add more phones per team, but this may be a possibility.  With the free version, you can have up to five teams playing the game at once.  Once the teams were in, I clicked on start/stop and set the game for 30 minutes.

Here is the BEST part: while the students are playing, I get an update any time they submit something!  Therefore, I can tell what is going on even though I am sitting back in my room.  Here are some of the videos that I saw coming across my screen:

I could also give bonus points or takeaway points while they were doing this.  If I wanted to add points, I could do that by entering the points.  Using the bonus point feature, I could also subtract points by adding the subtraction symbol with the points (-100 etc).  The students didn’t actually see this though while they were playing.

While they are playing, we can all see the leaderboard.  Then once the game is over, I can see all of the pictures in each section:

This was a lot of fun for my students to do.  It gives them a lot of input with reading, and it allows them a way to visualize their learning.  Plus they completed about one task a minute- which is a good pace!  I hope you will check out Goosechase!