We may think we're pretty smart, but in fact we have very little notion of how humans learn. Kids know: They play games. Until, that is, they go to school. That's when the games stop. And often, so does the learning.
It's been almost a year since I first wrote about the work of Joel Levin (aka " The Minecraft Teacher") bringing the 3D world-building game Minecraft into his second-grade classroom. Much has changed since then -- the full release of the PC version of the game, for starters.
Recently I've spent some time reading parenting websites about Minecraft. What is said is often repetitive, aggregated and lacks much substance. If you are a parent, or Minecraft player, then I hope this post will provide you with some further ideas about how the game works on our minds.
This wiki was put together by Lucas Gillispie (@PCSTech) from the Penderton County School district in North Carolina. Minecraft is used widely in PCS and this wiki provides great resources for those using or interested in using minecraft in a school setting.
The official wiki for the minecraftEDU community. Every day, more and more teachers are using the world-building game Minecraft to engage and educate. The game is a true phenomenon and gamers young and old are using it in countless creative ways. Practitioners of Games Based Education have realized the potential and have embraced Minecraft in classrooms around the world. MinecraftEdu is the collaboration of a small team of educators and programmers from the United States and Finland. We are working with Mojang AB of Sweden, the creators of Minecraft, to make the game affordable and accessible to schools everywhere. We have also created a suite of tools--a modified Minecraft server and client--that make it easy to unlock the power of Minecraft in your classroom.
MinecraftEdu is the collaboration of a small team of educators and programmers from the United States and Finland. We are working with Mojang AB of Sweden, the creators of Minecraft, to make the game affordable and accessible to schools everywhere. We have also created a suite of tools that make it easy to unlock the power of Minecraft in YOUR classroom.