Dan DavisEmerging Technologies Assessment Project

ITEC7445

Shared Vision

Columbia County’s vision of empowering and inspiring ALL learners to excel is met with the rigor, depth, and engagement found in Minecraft Education Edition:

• Teachers and students work together in Minecraft Education Edition (MEE)

• Collaboration and communication in an online society is a key feature of MEE

• Problem solving is built in to certain modes of MEE

• Digital citizenship skills found in MEE teach students to respect and value each other

Cost and Funding

• Since the program is online and easy-to-access, overhead costs are low. The program can be installed on any Internet-connected device.

• Teacher and student accounts are priced a $5 per user license, although bulk-purchase pricing will apply. Pricing can be incorporated into 1:1 technology fee for the 2017 school year.

• A free trial version will be offered so that students and teachers can try out MEE before license purchase.

• The maintenance and facilitation costs associated with the program involve managing updates on school-owned devices, typically paid for with the instructional technology budget.

ImplementationMicrosoft Office 365

• MEE is easily accessed and licenses purchased through the Office 365 program package

• The Columbia County School System can add the license agreement to its Microsoft agreement starting in the summer of 2016

• Students can access MEE at home using their Office 365 login

Training

• Since Minecraft is in widespread use, students and teachers can work together to learn MEE

• Books, videos, and online tutorials make it easy to learn at any age!

• Online sites such as Minecraft U, Craft Academy, and MinecraftEduGoogle Group offer lesson plans and training

• Eliminates much of the need for in-service training and resource compilation

Age and Appropriateness• MEE is used to teach Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics

standards (STEAM)

• History and Social Studies concepts can be built and modeled in a functional enviroment

• Language Arts skills are used in discussion and explanations or writing about creations

• Minecraft is open and accessible to all K-12 aged students and all adults

Incorporating Minecraft – just start crafting!

• CCBOE Minecraft users will gain access to their accounts with the familiar Office 365 login

• Minecraft is available to download onto desktop or laptop (Windows) computers in media centers, computer labs, and classrooms

• Students can download or sign in to their account on mobile devices running iOS or Android operating systems

• MEE has teacher tutorials, lesson plans, and challenges embedded

• Students can work independently, in small groups, or as a whole class in the MEE environment

• Teachers set up assignments and roles within the environment

• Students provide seed numbers, screenshots, or photos of their creations for each assignment

Ethics and Legalities• Since students use a unique, recorded login through Microsoft

Office 365, accounts can be monitored by the county.

• User license agreements are handled by Microsoft.

• Cyberbullying over the traditional Minecraft platform is curtailed due to the users being tracked by login account.

Minecraft Meets Standards and GoalsLanguage Arts Integration

• Biographical features can be built to lead discussions about notable writers, characters, or the students themselves

• Recall and reflection writings help strengthen crafting and writing skills.

Additional standards correlations can be found here from MinecraftEdu

Math Integration

Minecraft addresses concepts such as:• Counting

• Volume and Area

• Scales and Proportions

• Multiplication

Higher Order Skills:• Computing

• Coding

• Engineering

Science Integration

Witness Life Science interactions between plants, animals, humans, and the Minecraft environment.

Every major Earth biome is presented in Minecraft, each with unique resources and Earth Science topics.

Higher Order Skills:Physical Science students can craft topics such as cells, proteins, molecules, and organs using Minecraft.

Use real-life images and locations to reconstruct geography and history concepts.

Higher Order Skills:Build and explore to see the effects of human-environmental interactions.

Craft future plans to help guide rural and urban planners and community leaders.

Social Studies Integration

Differentiation and Diversity

• Minecraft Education Edition offers full differentiation in terms of student personalization and diverse student populations.

• The program is accessible on school and student devices

• Teachers assign individual or small group activities to meet all IEP requirements

• Students can take photos to provide evidence of their learning and building and share them with their teachers and other Minecrafters

• The open world format allows users to craft at their own level, from absolute beginner to master Minecrafter, thus giving a leveled approach to the program

• Promotes higher order thinking skills, problem solving, and collaboration from all learners.

Minecraft Facilitates Communication

• MEE takes a high-interest gamification scenario and turns it into a functional teaching tool.

• Students and teachers communicate through open dialogue channels integrated into the program user interface.

• Students can transfer knowledge from MEE into classroom and family discussions.

• Many of the skills learned within the program have real-world applications.

• Parents can track the progress and crafts of their students to monitor

Technical Support

• Since the 2014 purchase of Minecraft, Microsoft has developed a mentor program to allow educators to have a skilled partner in implementing the program into a classroom

• Mentors have a proven background record of using Minecraft in an educational setting

• Mentors are available by common social media and by Skype

Technical Support on the MinecraftEdu Wiki

What Does the Research Say?

Video games are a great way to engage studentsand personalize lessons. They provide “anopportunity to focus our energy, with relentlessoptimism, at something we’re good at (or gettingbetter at) and enjoy” [McGonigal, 2011].Researchers in 2013 found that 30 minutes of dailyvideo game play led to increased brain plasticityalong with additional development in areas crucialfor spatial reasoning, strategic planning, workingmemory, and motor ski l ls [Kunh, 2013].

from Minecraft Education Edition FAQ

Scientific American declared “…“not only is Minecraft immersive and creative, but it is an excellent platform for making almost any subject area more engaging.”

From EdTechReview

Reflection

Minecraft is the number three top-selling video game of all time, with millions of users in the United States alone. Minecrafters come from every age, race, gender, socioeconomic status, and student learning level found within Columbia County.

The purpose of this emerging technology assessment was to prove how incorporating Minecraft Education Edition within the Microsoft Office 365 suite would benefit the county’s educational services.

Since its creation in 2011, Minecraft has shown to increase engagement, creativity, problem-solving, communication, and collaboration amongst its users.

References and Resources

Kuhn, S. (2015). Playing Super Mario induces structural brain plasticity. Molecular Psychiatry, 19, 265-271.

• http://education.minecraft.net

• https://minecraftedu.com/

• http://services.minecraftedu.com/wiki/Main_Page

• https://sites.google.com/site/kidsnetsoftminecraft/resources

• http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2010/09/the-true-story-behind-the-amazing-minecraft-enterprise-d/