I watched "The Maze Runner" last week, and followed that up by reading the first 2 books of the series. I was on the way to PE and had the idea that the idea of the Maze could really be fun for the students experience the movie through play.
The Setup:
1. Create the maze: This is the most difficult part. For my maze, I used 2 standing crash mats to mark out the "Safe" area where the Runners live. I used every available tumbling mat, bench, and hockey net to set up a maze that had multiple paths.
2. Create the objectives: I used little foam dodgeball and scattered them around for the runners to find.
4. Divide the students into 2 even groups. One group is the Runners, and one is the Grievers.
The Rules:
1. The Runners must try and get as many balls from the maze as possible.
2. The Grievers will scoot around and try and tag them "out". Grievers are not allowed in the safe zone.
3. The Runners may not make contact with the Maze in any form - no knocking over walls, moving objects. If they do they are "out"
4. The Runners may not step or jump over any benches, if they do they are "out". This is the rule to watch most from a safety concern. Students will easily trip when jumping and chasing each other. Plus, the maze becomes trivial when benches are ignored.
5. The Grievers must be seated on the scooters at all times. This keeps their speed down and engages their core more. It's more exercise and safer.
6. After a pre-arranged time (1 minute, 2 minutes) switch teams. Anyone who got "out" is back in the game.
What I Get To Do:
I keep track of the rules. I also get to alter the maze.
When I see that the Runners are using a path a lot to leave the safe zone, I move obstacles to trap them outside, and force them to take longer paths back into the safe zone. If I see that the Grievers are "guarding" an entrance, I open up a new one and close the old one, so the Grievers need to find a different location.
The Results:
Both teams had a lot of fun and were very active. This was enjoyable whether or not the students had seen the movie.
Grievers had to work together to get out the Runners, and the Runners had to keep track of maze movements and plan out their routes constantly. Sometimes the Grievers would get trapped by the maze and have to go the long way around to rejoin the action.
Students that get "out" don't have to wait too long to get in, plus the game is almost as much fun to watch as it is to play.
Things I Tried (That didn't really work):
This game took several iterations to get into its current form. I tried:
- Giving the Runners the "Daytime/Nighttime" schedule and having the Grievers only come out at night. This resulted in half of the students waiting a lot of time, and only short periods of exciting activity.
- Having both Runners and Grievers on scooters. We ran out of scooters.
- Dividing the students into 3 groups and having 1 group move the maze. Students don't know how to fairly move the maze.
- Having the Runners work cooperatively to get all of the target balls. Most of them wouldn't leave safety.
Things I Will Try Next:
I would like to try re-introducing the "Day / Night" schedule and have the safe zone close during the Night cycle. This would more closely mirror the Night from the movie. Plus, the horror of having the door close as you get near!
