However, for any schools or home educators looking to get started with the Education Edition, you can get check it out on the Microsoft website.Following months of testing and free trials for early adopters, Microsoft announced this morning that its learning-focused version of the popular Minecraft game, Minecraft: Education Edition, is now available for purchase. Costing $5 (around £4 / AU $7) per student for a year’s subscription, it’s a costly addition to the classroom and requires students to have regular access to computers equipped with either Windows 10 or macOS, which not all schools can manage.įor a fun home experience, you’re better off with standard Minecraft. But it’s unlikely that it will take over the classroom considering the pressure it puts on educators to create worlds and plan lessons that use them effectively.Īs well as this, the software isn’t free. Microsoft: Education Edition certainly offers students a dynamic and interesting learning experience. However, it seems unfair and impractical to expect that teachers should spend their days teaching lessons and their evenings not only planning future lessons, but building virtual worlds for them too. It’s great that Microsoft is able to offer this. To help teachers completely new to the Minecraft world, Microsoft offers a Minecraft Mentor program which will teach them how to effectively integrate the game into their classroom. The problem is, creating a Minecraft world is a time consuming process, even for someone familiar with the game. Minecraft (Switch) at Walmart for $29.88.Though the Microsoft website is already populated with a wide range of creative and interesting lesson plans, these aren’t endless and Microsoft is counting on teachers to add more worlds and lesson plans themselves. However, it seems like it could be an added pressure for educators. Microsoft says the game is supposed to create “unique and creative learning experiences for educators and students alike”. At the moment there are lesson plans for students from the ages of 5 all the way up to college level. Minecraft: Education Edition is primarily to be used in classrooms. The tools include a map through which teachers can track the location of their students in the game, as well as in-game chalkboards, and worlds themed around the lesson plans. Minecraft: Education Edition includes classroom specific tools that make it easier for teachers to bring creative collaboration into the classroom and make sure all of their students are getting the most out of a lesson. In classes with larger numbers of students, it can be difficult for teachers to control multiple groups of students working on different projects. Not only that, it’s an organised and more manageable way to enable students to collaborate. For students who struggle to get their heads around things like fractions by looking at numbers alone, seeing them used in these familiar digital settings could be a huge help.Īccording to Microsoft, the use of play-based learning in a virtual environment that students are familiar with is much more engaging for students. The lessons enabled by Minecraft are much more visual and immersive than anything students could get from a textbook or physical group work. There are also geometry lessons which have classes construct shapes in order to learn about the concepts of perimeter and area and recreations of historical settings. Examples of lessons include exploring and understanding deforestation by having students create Minecraft worlds which show the before and after effects of deforestation and discuss calls to action for slowing the process.
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