1st place - Scavenger hunt (Dennis Westermann)

Laudation: Kids love hide-and-seek. And one classic game is the scavenger hunt, in which objects or riddles are hidden for others to find. “Schnitzeljägerei” brings this idea to an app for kids. But not everything is digital—the ten game cards are meant to be hidden in a room or outdoors. The hiders then use the app to take a photo of just a small portion of the hiding spot, so that only the clues are visible. Using the same app, the other children search for the hidden cards based on the photos. Then they scan the QR code on the card they’ve found and look for the next one. At the end, there’s a prize. The kids have a lot of fun with this, and they realize that it’s not just about choosing good hiding spots—they also have to be careful about what’s in the frame of their photo.

Here’s what the media educators say: Where’s the best place to hide the cards? That’s the challenge of the scavenger hunt. Using the accompanying app, simple playing cards with a QR code must be hidden in a room in the apartment or in the yard. The children who are hiding the cards must take a photo of the hiding spot with the app’s camera in such a way that it’s not easily recognizable but provides good clues. When a card is found, it’s registered via the QR code. It’s an interesting twist on the classic scavenger hunt. On the one hand, the children have to be careful not to give themselves away with the photo; on the other hand, the seekers have to look closely to spot the hiding spots. This makes it a lot of fun for both sides: those hiding and those searching.