Friday, December 4, 2015

Adding Minecraft To Our Schooling

I have to admit, I haven't been much of a fan of using Minecraft as part of our schooling. A friend of mine is always telling me how much her kids are addicted to the game. Well, so are mine, but I've seen some of the things they have been making with it and I have to say that I didn't see the point of the game until I went online to research the game. Of course it has been around for a couple of years, but I don't stay on top of the newest item of attractions.

Well, let's just say that with the combination of the game and tutorials on YouTube, I learned to play the game myself. I thought it's really easy to use with the exception of playing it on my Android phone to avoid from the kids seeing me playing it, LOL. I didn't want to start with something small, I wanted to see how hard it would be to do a challenging design. So, I chose to build a mansion with three levels.


This mansion was actually easier than it looks. Once I finished it, I had a sit down with the kids and asked them if they would be willing to start building some difficult designs in Minecraft. Of course they said yes, but when I asked them what kind of things they would like to build, it was pretty funny because they picked, Wal-Mart, Target, McDonalds, and a hotel. Thankfully all of these are available on YouTube. 




My ten year old and I are building the hotel. The hotel is nine videos to complete. I think my challenge so far is keeping up with my ten year old, LOL he's always a step ahead of me. I'm still working the twenty-six high glass blocks around the whole first level. He's already done with that and awaiting on my completion.



My daughter chose to build Wal-Mart in Minecraft. She's doing really well and was surprised that she did the lettering and star very well without much help. She's now working on the layers around Wal-Mart.



I would say this design so far is fairly simple if your going in the right direction, LOL. My other son is working on this and he was doing great at first, but then after he did the front and one side, he does the other side in the opposite direction for the foundation. So, he's working on taking the blocks out and putting the right blocks in the right direction.


This one I saved for last because my 13 year old is making the McDonald's in Minecraft. He wants to build like all the well known resturants. He started this design after supper last night and finished it before bedtime at ten. I think that's pretty fast for the amount of details in this. However, that was the outside of the restaurant that he finished. 



So, to wrap this up to why we are adding minecraft to our schooling? I think it's great for the classroom because it's not just a game, but gets your children the ability to learn how to use blocks and turn them into something amazing. 

So far this what I've learned from playing the game, but there's so much more that your child can benefit from playing. Such as History, Science, Math and Reading. I will share more as I learn more through playing this game. 

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