Kids love playing Minecraft!

My school will be using this software to tap into the digital block obsession and turn it into fun math and science. We are looking to give our students the opportunity to use a game that they are extremely passionate about and turn it into learning.

Of course all of the required standards will still be covered, but we will be providing students with advanced technological education as well. Other schools globally are finding that by using Minecraft.Edu, students are working more collaboratively and creating worlds that are far more advanced that by using regular paper and pencil. This is a new way to think about education. Minecraft gives us a chance to reach students who are reluctant to participate in the lessons. But it also gives us a chance to reach our gifted kids.



The funding for the project will provide us with Minecraft servers that allow for teacher control and software licenses for all of the school's computers. Once we have the software in place, we will be able to create lessons for the students in all areas and grade levels.

Curriculum lessons will include: Reading teachers will have students recreate favorite part of stories with the characters and setting from the stories. Math teachers will explore geometry, multiplication/division, and graphing skills while building worlds. Science teachers will have the students create biomes to teach ecosystems. Social Studies teachers will share cultures from around the world.

Here are some prepared lessons that I found some on the Minecraft.Edu site:

The Graphing Zone 3.MD.3 - Draw a scaled picture graph and a scaled bar graph to represent a data set with several categories. Solve one- and two-step “how many more” and “how many less” problems using information presented in scaled bar graphs.



Division Farms 3.OA.3 - Use multiplication and division within 100 to solve word problems in situations involving equal groups, arrays, and measurement quantities, e.g., by using drawings and equations with a symbol for the unknown number to represent the problem.



Sky Tree Farms 5.MD.1 - Convert like measurement units?Convert among different-sized standard measurement units within a given measurement system (e.g., convert 5 cm to 0.05 m), and use these conversions in solving multi-step real world problems.



Coordinate Hunt 6.NS.4 - Find the greatest common factor of two whole numbers less than or equal to 100 and the least common multiple of two whole numbers less than or equal to 12. Use the distributive property to express a sum of two whole numbers 1-100 with a common factor as a multiple of a sum of two whole numbers with no common factor.



Learning a new computer system will be the largest challenge. This will also be part of the fun! The teachers will be learning with the students.

Kids absolutely love it when they are the experts and they can help teach the other students and the teachers!