Microsoft recently announced that the incredibly popular open world video game Minecraft may be coming to a classroom near you. Minecraft is actually already used in 7,000 classrooms across 40 countries as an educations tool. Microsoft is now looking to push those numbers much higher with their recent acquisition of MinecraftEdu, a title from Teacher Gaming LLC. Anthony Salcito who is the Vice President of Worldwide Education for Microsoft had this to say in his blog post about the Education Edition and examples of how it’s being used already.
Over the past year, you’ve heard me mention the possibilities we’re seeing with Minecraft in education. By creating a virtual world and then advancing in it, students can learn digital citizenship, empathy, social skills and even improve their literacy – while getting real time feedback on their problem solving skills from the teacher.
Alfriston College students in New Zealand are partnering with Auckland War Memorial Museum to learn the history of the New Zealand people who served in the 1915 Gallipoli campaign by re-creating the landscape in Minecraft, block by block. Middle schoolers are learning the building blocks of computer science in an online Minecraft coding camp.Elementary students in Scotland are learning about city planning and engineering by reimaging, redesigning and then building in Minecraft what they think Dundee waterfront should look like.”
A trial version the Education Edition is expected to be released this summer. Parents and Teachers alike can head over to the Minecraft Education Edition Website and sign up for updates as well as check out current starter lessons being offered.
The idea of Minecraft in an education setting is certainly an interesting one. What do you think of the Education Edition? Could this potentially be paving a new way for students to learn in the classrooms? Be sure to let us know in the comments below and check back for future updates.
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