Metals and Non-metals, Properties Escape Room KS3

Finish and reinforce a middle school lesson on the properties of metals and non – metals or revisit it prior to exams with this innovative, enjoyable and challenging escape room lesson.

Students must work their way through the clues to find the code to a combination lock on the school storeroom where a squirrel, who was found injured on the school campus, has been accidentally locked in its pet carrier while awaiting transportation to the vet for urgent medical treatment. The combination lock used is one of two bought by the school – one for the stock room and the other for a new escape room lesson being planned by the science department. Both are set to the same combination. The paper on which the combination was written for the escape room lesson has been lost but the department still has copies of
the lesson.

Prior Knowledge Required

• Metals are conductors of electricity and heat while non - metals are insulators.
• Metals are strong (have high tensile strength) but non - metals are not.
• Metals are shiny when freshly cut or polished but non -metals are dull.
• Metals are sonorous (make a ringing noise when struck while non – metals do not.
• Metals are malleable (can be beaten into shape) and ductile (can be drawn into wires) but non – metals are neither and are brittle (shatter when struck.
• Iron, nickel and cobalt are magnetic but all non – metals are not magnetic.
• Metals are heavy which means they have a high have a high density because they contain a lot of particles. Non – metals are not heavy.
• Metals are all solids at room temperature, except for mercury which is a liquid, as they have high boiling and melting points. Of seventeen non - metals, all are gases except for five which are solids and one which is a liquid.
• Both metals are non – metals burn in oxygen to form the oxide.
• Metal oxides are alkaline and non -metal oxides are acidic.

What You Get

• PowerPoint – scene setting and instructions (sound effects and built-in timer);
• crossword;
• word search;
• dominoes activity;
• worksheet;
• code breaker sheet;
• answers;
• lesson plan.

If time is limited just the crossword, word search and domino can be used. The worksheet is the most challenging clue to solve and this can be omitted completely for less able classes.

Both 3 and 4 number combination locks can be purchased very cheaply online or the teacher can pretend to phone the school office for the staff to attempt to release the squirrel

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