“A challenge they look forward to."

How standards-aligned games bring CTE content to life for students in Prince William County Public Schools.

The room hummed with excitement. Teachers worked quickly to solve the puzzles and challenges on the tables in front of them. There was deep collaboration–and a lot of fun—as teachers raced to be the first group to ‘breakout”.  That’s when Mary Beth Dobbins fell in love with Breakout EDU. Then a light bulb went off. 

A long-time business teacher and central office administrator, Mary Beth said she “immediately saw how this could be a fun way to engage kids with content-specific challenges.” It wasn’t just that Breakout EDU could build students’ imagination and harness their creativity, but she saw that teachers could easily use Breakout EDU to teach specific technical skill standards and CTE concepts.

Now the Career and Technical Education Coordinator for Prince William County Public Schools, Mary Beth Dobbins guides programs, teachers, and students in grades 6-12 through strategic planning, curriculum development, recruitment, mentoring, and professional development. That includes finding tools that will help her staff bring Virginia’s CTE curriculum frameworks to life.

Prince William County Public Schools (PWCS) offers a wide variety of rigorous and engaging Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs designed to improve academic and technical understanding, offer leadership opportunities, and deliver instruction through realistic, hands-on applications. Every day, CTE teachers in PWCS middle and high Schools demonstrate the relevance and purpose in learning as students prepare for post-secondary experiences, whether they plan to enter the workforce directly, seek additional training, or enroll in a post-secondary institution. 

“A perfect fit”

In their middle schools, PWCS offers CTE courses as part of the exploratory encore rotation. Students explore new subjects and interest areas while preparing for high school and beyond. CTE courses provide opportunities to learn skills in independent living, technology, engineering, business, workplace readiness, and career planning.

Kenya Miles, the business education teacher at Rippon Middle School, is one of the PWCS teachers preparing students for their post-secondary path. She teaches Computer Science Discoveries for sixth grade, Career Discoveries for seventh grade, and STEM Applications for eighth grade.

“I like to use the “Caught in the Code” game with my sixth graders because they're learning computer science discoveries, which is all about problem-solving,” she said. “This Breakout is a perfect fit for them because they look at the binary code and then decode it – and it’s challenging in other ways and causes them to work together. I usually have them work with a partner or a small group.”

For Kenya, using a Breakout with her students is a perfect fit. 

“It kind of does all of the things. They have to problem solve, they have to collaborate with other students, and it also hits the content,” she said. 

Kenya also uses Breakout EDU in her other classes, or when students need a brain-break. But she knows something they don’t.

“Students actually find it to be fun, so they get excited about it,” she said. “But I know it's not really a brain-break because they're being challenged and they really have to think.” 

“Students also get excited about the relevant content,” said Kenya. 

From zombies, and space exploration, to popular TV shows and movies, Breakout EDU gets students excited about stories and worlds they love engaging with.

“My students look forward to it”

In the High School Career & Technical Education Programming, PWCS students explore their career interests while gaining valuable knowledge and skills that prepare them for their career and post-secondary studies. All high schools offer a variety of CTE courses in eight program areas as well as one or more admission-based CTE programs.  Each course includes an opportunity to earn a recognized industry credential. 

Kelley Endreola, a business teacher at Battlefield High School, has been in the classroom for over 20 years. Selected as a 2020 George Mason University Regional Outstanding Economics Educator of the Year, she is always searching for fun ways to cover the VDOE’s workplace readiness competencies. 

Whether using the ready-to-play challenges from Breakout EDU’s library of games, such as Finance Frenzy, or editing premade games, Kelley loves the excitement of Breakout EDU.  If she is looking for a game that matches a standard specific to the VDOE CTE Course Sequences, she uses the Game Design Tool to customize games or build new ones.

“I schedule Breakout EDU challenges at the end of the block because my students look forward to it,” Kelley said. “For the last half hour, we'll go down to the library and that makes them eager to finish everything else that we have to do beforehand. It's the treat at the end of the lesson.”

With Breakout EDU, students develop critical skills including creative thinking, collaboration, and communication. 

“Getting them to rely on each other and to know who they can rely on in their group and how to ask for what they need,” she said. “Breakout EDU is awesome for that.” 

Kelley has also found a cheat code for kit-based games that she thinks more people should know about. 

“We've been very fortunate that the librarians helped with all the kit setup and then reset them for us. That makes it so much easier for us to schedule. We really hit the jackpot with our librarians being so on board with them,” she said. 

Fall down seven times, get up eight

PWCS CTE staff are preparing students for the demands of 21st-century life. For Mary Beth, Breakout EDU offers a unique experience.

“I like the fact that the kids are not successful right away and they have to fail and try again because we need to build that resilience,“ said Mary Beth. “We need for them to understand that when they get into the workplace they're not going to be graded on everything. They are going to have to fail and ask for help and sometimes that's the hardest thing for them to really understand.”

Breakout EDU offers a way for teachers to facilitate productive struggle, and help students see that it's okay to not know everything.  

“When we don’t give them the hint, and instead let them work it out… that's how they get that satisfaction from being successful and putting the effort in,” said Mary Beth.

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Breakout EDU gamifies learning to create an engaging and empowering experience for students of all grade levels. There are over 1,800 kit-based and digital games on the Breakout EDU platform in a wide variety of topics and subjects, making it easy to find the perfect game for any lesson or classroom event.

Standards-aligned games challenge players to apply their content knowledge in a collaborative way. Uncovering clues alongside their peers creates an engaging and enriching adventure that successfully unlocks the love of learning!

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