Minecraft in Education: A Powerful Tool for Learning

Did you know that Minecraft, the all-time best-selling computer game, can be used for educational purposes in your classes? After Microsoft purchased Minecraft, they released an educational version with special features to help teachers create lessons in Minecraft. As of October 2021, Minecraft has sold over 238 million copies worldwide, making it one of the most popular video games of all time. Minecraft's ability to engage students and facilitate fun and interactive learning has made it increasingly popular in education.

Minecraft offers a wide range of educational benefits, including the development of creativity and problem-solving skills, collaboration, and programming and coding skills. Minecraft also provides opportunities to explore history, culture, and environmental science. In fact, here you can create a lesson for any academic subject.

For example, Minecraft is an excellent platform for carrying out chemical experiments without any safety risks. Students can experiment with chemical reactions using the elements table in Minecraft. Minecraft also allows students to create fully automated systems, promoting critical thinking skills. Students can design and build factories that automate various tasks, which is nearly impossible in real-life settings.

Minecraft Education Edition can be a valuable tool in English language classes, as it provides an engaging and interactive environment for language learning. 

Teachers can use Minecraft to create language learning activities that involve building and exploring in-game worlds, solving puzzles, and completing challenges that require the use of English language skills. For example, students can work together to build a virtual city, describing their structures and using descriptive language to give directions to each other. They can also create and share stories, scripts, and dialogues in-game, practising their writing and speaking skills. Additionally, Minecraft can be used to teach grammar and vocabulary, as students can learn new words and phrases by interacting with objects and characters in the game. Overall, Minecraft Education Edition offers a unique and immersive way to supplement traditional language learning methods and make English language classes more engaging and enjoyable for students.

Minecraft Education Edition is a specialized version of the game designed for educational purposes. It includes many educational features, such as classroom management tools, lesson plans and activities, collaboration tools, and cross-curricular connections. The game is also accessible to learners with disabilities, and the Code Builder feature helps students learn coding and programming skills. Minecraft Education Edition also promotes creative expression and exploration, allowing students to experiment with ideas and designs.

As an English teacher, I have integrated Minecraft into my lessons for nearly three years. I have witnessed the sheer joy of playing a computer game in class and the significant improvement in my students' skills. I have also created games specifically for Minecraft education, such as my Minecraft game for presenting superlatives and comparatives. Additionally, my students have created a full virtual reality game in Minecraft with my guidance, which has been selected for the European Training Foundation’s 2022 database as an innovative teaching material.

If you want to try Minecraft in your classes, head to the official Minecraft Education website. There, you will find many courses on deploying Minecraft in lessons, full lesson plans for various academic subjects, and innovative teaching materials. Minecraft Education Edition is a powerful tool that promotes engagement, collaboration, and creativity while providing valuable learning opportunities.

Below, you’ll find my Minecraft game created in the Minecraft Education edition. It’s about comparatives and superlatives. You can download it and play it in Minecraft Education with your students. You can even play it as a network game, which will be a fantastic lesson for them. If you play it in your network, I strongly suggest using the classroom mode application. It gives you the ability to control your whole class in Minecraft digitally.