Cryptology Treasure Hunt
Following the cryptology unit I like to encourage students to participate in a treasure
hunt. The treasure hunt is composed of 5 or more levels, with rewards for completion
of one or more levels. The levels get increasingly more difficult and involve the decrypting of secret messages. The final treasure hunt prize is a first come first
serve reward, valued at over $50.00.
The first treasure hunt, in the fall of 1995, was a success! Over 75% of students
in computer classes participated, with a few students and parents from outside of
the class joining in as well. Most everyone easily deciphered the map cipher that
was given to participants. It used trees to encipher a secret message indicating where to
find the level 2 message.
Level 2 was an ASCII message that was hidden behind a poster in the classroom. Close
to 50% of the students successfully deciphered the ASCII message indicating that
there was an invisible ink message inside of a dictionary. It wasn't long before
the librarians told me to make an announcement about the destruction of their library! I
then informed students of areas in the building where the message would not be.
Some students started slowing down and didn't make an effort early on to find the
message. I responded by creating a deadline at the end of the week for all people
to reach level 3 or be out of the treasure hunt for good. About a dozen people found
the invisible ink message inside of dictionaries inside of my classroom. The message said
something like "Sorry, I didn't have enough time to make an invisible ink message.
Solve this riddle to find the level 4 message." The note went on to make a riddle
about a fiddle and a tree, true gibberish.
The next day the music teacher told me about how students were tearing her room apart
for the secret message and wanted to know more about what I was doing with my computer
classes! Some of the students realized that the message was actually a red herring and did contain an invisible ink message. The message was "P. Towel," standing for
paper towel.
Many students approached me with comments about P.E. towels and wanted to know if
they could search the towels in the opposite gender's locker room. I encouraged
cooperative learning across genders and said nothing further! Four students unrolled
the paper towel in my room and found a secret message indicating that they needed to see
me. They received a handful of candy and awaited the final level message, level
5.
Announcements were made in class, a deadline set, and level 5 participants had a meeting
with Mr. Dunham after school. They were given a secret message, in Base 8 random
number assignment, and were told that level 5 was the last level. This proved to
be too difficult and students never found the secret level 6 map code indicating where
the treasure was buried outside. I responded giving out the secret level 6 map to
level 5 participants and gave them 1 week to find the treasure. Two days later a
student proudly walked down the hall with a military ammunitions box full of candy, money,
and other goodies.
In reflection, I will be more clear regarding where the messages and treasure hunt
item can be found. The unit and treasure hunt was a success overall and was fun
for most. At the same time, students learned more about their own language, computer
languages, and cryptology in general. I look forward to my next treasure hunt in late March
of 1996, as do my students.