Episode One: 'The Block P3'

'The Block P3' has kicked off this term!

Say goodbye to what was once a boring measurement unit and hook students in with Minecraft, movie making and tons of creativity. 

The challenge was set, students at to form teams to compete in 'The Block P3'

Criteria:

Teams of 2-4
Pick a team name
Pick a team colour
Choose a team motto
Design a team poster
Film a small segment for the trailer to 'The Block P3'

Once students had completed the assigned tasks they began to design their own visions.
I set no criteria at this stage. We simply brainstormed what was necessary in a house and what was extra. I made it very clear to students that the more they added to their houses the harder the maths would be (some did not listen to this instruction and have made it rather challenging for themselves). I told students that the only math requirement for this section was that they had to have the perimeter written down for each room.

As they bought their maps to me to check I sent them off to check if their rooms were to scale. One student came to me with a child's room that was 4m long and 3m wide. I told that student to get rulers and map it on the classroom floor. She quickly realized this was much to small, this sparked a great class discussion about scale and students began wandering outside to pace out the size of garages, swimming pools and all the important man cave.

Once students finished their own maps complete with perimeters and to scale they sat down with their teams. They shared their maps and discussed the pros and cons of each persons design. They had an A3 piece of paper and began mapping out their team design. As they did this I asked to begin thinking about the criteria that we would need to judge these (we will be co-constructing the judging criteria next week).

They are aware that although they are designing their vision they know there will be alterations made based on the challenge that is given to them each week.

They will get their first challenge next week and will have to create a video of their room to add to their blogs as their episode. The winning room each week will feature on this blog and be shown to the other class that is competing as well.

How to differentiate this unit:

Give different groups different challenges based on their ability.
One group may have to design a lounge with a perimeter of 25m but it can't be a perfect square.
The next group might be working with the area of 15m squared.
It is up to you how hard or easy you make this unit for your students.


Next steps

- Students to design and build their first room based on the challenge criteria
- Students finish to filming their trailers
- Co construct the judging criteria

Also check out Mrs Hay's class and their Block adventure:

'The Block P2'

Teach Meet NZ Presentation

Teach Meet NZ for Connected Educators Month

I was asked by the lovely Sonya (@vanschaijik) to be a presenter for Teach Meet NZ in October because it is connected educators month.

I was a little apprehensive at first because I had never watched or been part of an online presentation and didn't know what to expect. I decided that I had to just jump in head first and give it a go.

What's the big deal about Minecraft?

Teach meet NZ presentation from kasseylee11

Sonya was lovely and helpful during the practice sessions and she taught me a few tips and tricks with using Google Hangout. Such as using the toolbox to add your twitter feed, how to screenshare and how to use the Q & A.

In the practice sessions my presentation was timed at 6 minutes (double the allowed time). I had to spend some time rearranging my speech to still be able to say what I wanted to say in way less words. This was great for keeping my thinking succinct.

On the day I was ridiculously nervous. I practiced my presentation at least ten times to make sure my time wasn't over three minutes. I had managed to get it down to 2:58. That right there is success!

I loved being a part of #CENZ14 and the Teach Meet NZ crew. All the educators who presented were fantastic!

As I was listening to these great educators I was tweeting out all the great content that was being presented.

TeachMeetNZ was an awesome way to network with other educators. At Ulearn I was able to meet some of the other presenters and discuss our experiences. 

Overall my experience was fantastic. I recommend it to everyone and anyone who gets the opportunity to participate in one of these, even if it is just watching the broadcast.

Transcript for my presentation:

What is the big deal about Minecraft?

It is incredibly simplistic

Appropriate for all ages

There is no goal or end, basically the game is a giant sandbox encouraging construction, creativity, exploration and survival

Minecraft is a basically an online version of Lego and it is a fantastic learning tool

So why do kids love it?

And the bigger question is why should teachers?

Minecraft covers the key competencies in the New Zealand Curriculum

Thinking – Students have to think constantly about what they are building and what their next steps are

Using Language, Symbols and Texts – Students are using rich language to discuss their projects. They are using words like mods, spawning, griefing and crafting to communicate with their peers

 Managing self – students set their own time frames alongside setting their own agenda and goals and they manage themselves to ensure they meet them

Relating to others – Teamwork and collaboration happens within the game and outside the game to support the learning

Participating and contributing – Students participate and contribute to the Minecraft community when they build amazing creations and share them with their peers

The simplistic graphics allow anything to be possible. They can build on a small scale such as building their dream classroom or on a large scale replicating an Ancient Egyptian city.

They dream it up and then they build it

 Students work together to create complex and elaborate structures. Often this will involve a planning process where a committee of students get together to develop a plan. While in the planning process students engage in rich discussion to bring their vision to life.

Minecraft experts step forward and become the leaders in the classroom

The game has built in social structures with LAN worlds and a chat function.

Players have access to Wikis, blogs, websites and message boards. They share tips and upload elaborate videos detailing the amazing things they've learned to build.

 Students are constantly reflecting on their creations.

They are willing to take risks, make mistakes, fix them and continue this forward thinking process.

It is important for students to be able to identify the learning when using Minecraft

I encourage my students to use their blogs to reflect on projects and share their designs

These are just some of the values that Minecraft can teach students

Minecraft is fun – Students don’t even realize all the values and skills they are learning. However they are engaged and contributing positively to the learning and classroom environment.

The following are all successful ways I have been able to use Minecraft in the classroom.

My most successful Minecraft project has been the recent fictional setting of Coconut Cove from the Novel Hoot. Students created maps, models and worked in teams to create a detailed replica of this city to scale using the setting description from the text.

I encourage you to allow your students to be the experts. Open the door and allow students to co-construct the path alongside you.

Minecraft and gaming is taking over the classroom. So come and join the movement!

#Ulearn14

Ulearn 2014

What an amazing conference!

It always is... but to have it in my own city just made it that much more special.

This was my third Ulearn conference and I can easily say it was the best one yet!

We were privileged enough to have our school Kapa Haka group preform on the Thursday morning to 1600+ attendees.

I was able to see and talk to ex students who were working at the conference and was even lucky enough to have one of my own students come and help our with our workshop.

I tried to summarise my experience in a tweet:

We were lucky enough to have 6 of our staff attend the three day conference. This meant when we saw something amazing we were able to discuss and reflect on how we could introduce that into our own classrooms and teams when we get back to school.

Highlights:

- Presenting on Minecraft - Sharing my passion with other educators and helping them on their journey

- Connecting, networking (Face to face and on Twitter)

- Talking and talking and talking about everything and anything with like minded educators

- Hearing the Poutama teams journey (Breakout 5)

- Steve Mouldey's creativity is not just for the arts

- Stephen Lethbridge's session on making way towards a maker culture

- Having so many of our staff attend!

- Sharing my love of Twitter with my staff & teaching them how to use it

- I won a t-shirt

Lowlights:

- Super tired now at the end of the week

- I don't have enough money to get all the amazing things I saw

- I never wanted it to end! 

Tweets from the last three days

Day One:

Day Two:

Day Three:

Goals

- To use some of the tools and models I saw during the breakouts to develop my students thinking and questioning skills

- Let my students have more choices - let them choose who to work with, how many they need in a group etc...

- I want to try use Trailblazer with my class for evidence of research in their inquiries

- Buy some robotics/electronics kits, get stuff from junk yards for student to have a maker session - get parents involved to

- Help change my staffs mindsets!

- Are our learning spaces being used effectively?

- Read the books Steve mentioned in his session 

My takeaway tips/lesson ideas/websites

-  The notion of creating problem finders

- What if statements - start engaging discussions and questioning activities 

- Creativity challenges

- Trailblazer

- New Twitter friends!

- Kahoot 

Our Minecraft Slides (Breakout 4)

Now I just need to find the time to sit down with my other staff and do our team reflection together.

This is my initial basic reflection.

As I go over my notes and resources I will continue to update this blog with how my goals are going. 

If I saw you at Ulearn or we tweeted then thank you!

Loved the connections and learning.

Hoot Server

A final video of our nearly completed Hoot server! 

Hoot (Minecraft)

New Minecraft Project!

P3 begged and begged until I finally gave in and said yes we can start a new Minecraft project.
Last year I did a similar project with  'The City of Ember' and it was hugely successful. We used the novel to help visualise and create alternate endings to the book.

This year with Hoot we will be using it in a similar way. I like the students to be able to take meaningful notes and then use those notes to support the design process. Once they have completed the town they will use it to give a guided tour, retell a chapter and recommendations for the novel.

Students have been keeping specific notes about the characters and settings we have been introduced to in the story.

Coconut Cove:

- Golf Course – 18 holes and a driving range 

- The camp of Mullet Fingers was off the golf course through a small forested area

- Roy’s House 

- Roads + Bus Stop + Bus 

- Police station

- Mother Paula’s Pancake house Construction site - Caravan, big fence and 4 dogs

- Auto parts yard - Ice Cream Truck

- Garage - Bike Repair

- Trace Middle School - Classrooms, cafeteria, teachers lounge, car park, bus bay

- Beach 

- Dana’s House - has a front porch

As they kept these notes they began developing a birds eye view map of 'Coconut Cove' the town from 'Hoot'. Once students had finished this we had a class vote on whose map they thought was the best depiction of the town.

No students have seen the movie so they were only going from description and and their imaginations.

Josh's map was the map the class chose as the best to use as a guide.
I printed out a copy of his map for each student to put into their reading book to help with planning out the city

We initially all went onto our own class server together but discovered that it was pointless until the roads were completed and each part of the map was plotted out because everyone was just building in random areas.

We nuked the server and started again. This time the roads groups went onto our class server first. Having a class server has been awesome, I have set it up to only allow 28 players (my class + myself) and they need my IP address to get on and this changes each day so no one from other classes can get on. I also have to have my direct server open on my computer for it to work, so no one can 'sneak' on during class time.

Once the roads are finished students will begin construction of their chosen buildings.

We will be blogging more about this process and students will be reflecting on their own blogs as we get further into the story.


UPDATE 10/9

Here are some pics of the buildings students have completed so far. We are aiming to be done in a week and then begin filming.

Minecraft Chat

Monday 2pm 

September 15th 

Question 1 - How does Minecraft improve/help your learning?

Question 2 - What is the best structure you have built on Minecraft?

Question 3 - How do you use Minecraft in your classroom?

Question 4 - What other ways do you think you could use Minecraft to help your learning?

Question 5 - Do you have a current Minecraft project you are working on? Tell us about it

Question 6 - How does your whanau feel about you using Minecraft in schools?

Question 7 - What device do you use Minecraft on?

Question 8 - What other games could you use in school to help your learning?

Use the Hashtag - #mckcnz

The original hastage was #minecraftkidschatnz but was changed to prevent spamming 

Minecraft PB4L City Update

Latest additions to our city:

- Farm

- McDonalds

- Burger King

- Theme Park

- Athletics Stadium

- Tram/Monorail

- New Homes

- Restaurant

- Waterslide

- Carpark

- Park

Minecraft PB4L City

Another year and another battle setting up and facilitating how I want/need Minecraft to run in our classroom. This year I am lucky enough that my team (myself + 3 other teachers) are on the MC bandwagon.


We began our Minecraft set up the same as we did last year.
I told all the students to go on and show me a creation. I asked them to build something to share with the class that showed their Minecraft skills. I do this for two reasons. Firstly I see the levels of skill and expertise in the room and secondly I am able to see the students' digital etiquette for one another. After this we used post it notes to reflect on our session. We reflected on what was good, what was bad, what our goals were for future projects and began creating our Minecraft treaty.

Student Positives:

- Teamwork
- Creativity
- Collaboration
- Communication
- Learning a new form of ICT
- Gaming in the classroom
- Maths (co-ordinates, volume, spatial awareness)
- Digital citizenship
- Our school values (respect, honesty, relationships and learning)

Student Negatives:

- Griefing
- People all trying to build on top of each other
- Some people not knowing how to play and needing constant help
- Issues for some getting on - having to go down to library and grab another laptop


Students used all of these to create a treaty that they all signed. They have agreed to abide by their treaty and have set consequences that they decided on for when they break it.

We then decided to build a PB4L (positive behaviour for learning) city.

We used another white sheet of paper to map out what our city required:
- Housing
- Roads
- Footpaths
- Workplaces - based on dream jobs
- Parks, forests, farms - nature related things


P3 began building all of the above. They were working very well with one another to achieve a successful result. We then bought in P2 and P3 became the tuakana teina to teach them how to use Minecraft. P2 then joined us in our area and began developing their own homes and workplaces alongside us. The students were commenting positively on newly formed relationships, successful teamwork and the ability to collaborate with a large group of students.

The main goal of this activity was to develop a digital etiquette and ensure our school values are also represented online.

The Power of Minecraft

Today I had an IEP and a parent said to me "My son read a poster on a window the other day, when I asked him how he learnt those words, he said Minecraft" I did a silent cheer of success!

Minecraft for me has gone from digging holes and creating havoc to a educational driven passion.
I am excited about the range of learning opportunities this tool provides. I am not going to call it a 'game' because for me and my class it is so much more!

I decided to undertake my own inquiry last year. I had a year 7/8 class with around 50% being keen Minecrafters and 10% experts. By the end of the year I could say I had 95% keen Minecrafters and 50% experts.

This year at week 3 I have already got 5 or 6 students bursting at the seams to get cracking (after all they heard about my class last year).

I can't wait to play around and discover more ways I can incorporate this into learning programme. I am just waiting for some light bulb moment or lightning bolt of inspiration to set me off!

Minecraft: Puzzle Maps

Puzzle maps has become the latest craze in my classroom.
They are maps created for single player mode. Players have to manipulate their way through obstacles and challenges to complete each map. In order to complete these challenges players have to follow instructions, rules and use logic and items collected to win!

I wanted to find a way these maps could be utilized in my classroom and across the curriculum.
I decided a great way to engage my boys in writing was to have them write a review on a map that they played or create a hint guide for solving the puzzles/challenges.

Initially students were overwhelmed by the choice of maps and spent too much time attempting to complete them. Once students got past this they were able to begin taking notes on each map to form their writing plan. Students are still in the planning process and some are further along than others. Our topic has come to an end and I wanted a fun way to wind down the term while still meeting our reading and writing criteria.

To extend on this some students have already started planning out their own maps and the puzzles they want to include once they have finished their writing task

Some of the maps students have attempted:

Temple of the Sun

The Ruins of Kegrin

Escape Jail

Latest Minecraft Mission

Walt: Collaborate and use the school values within Minecraft to create an online community.

Success Criteria - We will know we have achieved this when we have used our school values to create an online community/city that reflects these.

Goals:

1. Create a working city
2. Build my dream house
3. Build a place of work - e.g. - If you want to be a Vet build a Vet Clinic
4. Create a set of laws that each citizen/class member must abide by (these are to be written in a book in the city library).

We are using the chat function within Minecraft to collaborate, plan and create together.
Things to consider: Signs, roads, rivers, footpaths, trees, parks, schools


How we did this:

• P3 used the chat to discuss where they wanted to have a city, they discussed mainly the type of land (they wanted to be surrounded by lush green grass) and the location (they wanted it to be in a corner of the large map so no other classes would be able to grief buildings on our server).
• Dylan (our Minecraft expert) used a mod that he had to flatten a large area for the class to use for our city.
• Some of the other boys then took turns helping people to get to the city by giving explicit instructions of where to meet and then leading the way.

The beginning of the cities roads

Street Lights

An Ice Rink

Inside Ash's home

A Blacksmith -Ash's places of work

Antonio's Lounge - A TV surrounded by books - Sounds like heaven

The front of Antonio's and Zac's house

Natalya's House - Very colourful carpet

The start of the river that will run through the city

Manaia's house 

Roads complete with give-way lines and stop signs

We have been working on this for 30 minutes of class time in our PB4L slot and the students have been working on it before school and during their lunchtimes. 

I will keep you updated on how our city turns out!

______________________________________________________

Students have just finished reflecting on our previous Minecraft mission: The City of Ember

I am so pleased with how in depth some of their reflections are.

Natalya's Reflection

Kayleigh;s Reflection

Possible Teacher Inquiry...

My PRT blog has slowly become what appears to be a Minecraft obsession blog. I am strongly considering making this my teacher inquiry for the year. I am going to use my blog to pool together all the resources I am finding to begin this inquiry.

I am still thinking about what it is I want to find out. 

• What are the learning opportunities?
• Can Minecraft be integrated across the curriculum?
• Would the attendance of students increase if this was integrated into the classroom?
• Can this game be utilized appropriately to improve students academics? 
• Can we enhance student voice through Minecraft?

Resources:

Minecraft Guides

Minecraft in School

Minecraft Discoveries

Learning in Minecraft - the Massively @ jokaydia Guild

How did we get hooked into Minecraft?

Our journey with Minecraft at Mokoia Intermediate has only been brief, but we are certainly heading towards bigger things.

We began with only a Minecraft club which wasn't very big and ran one lunchtime a week last year. As Minecraft became more of a phenomenon so did the eagerness to join. Lunchtime became lunchtimes and a few students become too many for the limited server space we had.

Our DP then decided to dedicate the spare server we had to being a Minecraft server (this stopped a lot of the lagging and crashing of the game), this server allows for 60 people to be on at one time. At the beginning of this year our school introduced an arts block. During this block each teacher is allowed to choose their own specific focus within the arts curriculum and run this every Friday. Arts block was a huge success and Minecraft was definitely one of the more popular options. When we ran it again this term we got a shock, 86 children wanted to join up (this is huge when our roll is a little under 300). Unfortunately with only 60 spots we have had to have a waiting list. Instead of one teacher taking this it is now two of us.

Running Minecraft with 60 students (mostly boys) would sound like a nightmare to some, however it completely runs itself. Students who are experts become the teachers and the students who are beginners want to learn from other students. As a teacher I just ensure everyone is safe and happy.

As I learn more and more about what you can do in Minecraft I am beginning to set up challenges and goals for the students to build or inquire about. The learning in this game is mind boggling to me. How can a game with such poor graphics provide so much creativity?

I am loving that with the help of my students I am becoming an expert and I am thinking of new ones to embed it into our curriculum.

___________________________________________________________________________________


Next term our literacy focus is poetry. Below is a video of students reading a poem and recreating the poem within Minecraft. What a fantastic idea.




Another video I stumbled across (mentioned in a post below) was a time lapse video of a community of people collaborating to build an amazing city. As a class we watched this and discussed the idea of collaborating to build an ancient civilization (which is our social studies focus next term), I then took this idea next door to the Year 8 digital teacher who immediately wanted to jump on board. We as two classes are going to use Google Docs (for the planning) and minecraft to construct an ancient civilization . We are going to trial this as being student led and facilitate when necessary. Very exciting!!

Minecraft Lesson Ideas

I have been scratching my head to think of all the learning opportunities I can utilizes Minecraft for. I decided that it was time to jump onto the VLN and check out some of the Minecraft forums and discussions. I feel like I have hit a goldmine of teachers with like minded thinking. I am a very give it a go teacher and love trialing new programs and activities within my classroom.

One of my students wrote a very interesting reflection on her experience with Minecraft - Kayleigh (Minecraft: What is the learning?). I am often reflecting on the learning experiences we do as a class and I am beginning to encourage my children to do the same. I like them to recognize the learning they are doing and take the initiative to further this themselves. My mentor made an interesting comment about how sometimes the learning we are intending to occur is not always the learning that the students achieve. 

Lesson Ideas (Love these, I have listed below the ideas I like the best in each curriculum area) 

Literacy

1. Write a procedural text on how to craft an iron pickaxe
2. Write a story about a character that falls in to the world of Minecraft. Illustrate your story with screen shots from your Minecraft world.
3. Through the Minecraft chat, explain to your teacher who is on another computer how to make herself a crafting table.
4. Your character in Minecraft is called “Steve”. Research why he is called “Steve”
5. Create a 10 question quiz using the Minecraftwiki then swap with a partner. 

Social Studies

1. Recreate a village/town based on a culture you have researched
2. As a team, create a self sufficient community that includes different roles and responsibilities for its members. 
3. Create a set of laws, or a constitution for your Minecraft world. Firstly appoint someone in you class as the king or queen, and have them create the laws. Then after a week or so, create a new set democratically. How are the two sets of laws different?
4. Appoint a King or Queen and give them absolute power for a week. Now try another week but this time using the ideals of democracy.
5. Cooperate with a class in another school/country to build a “perfect world” together. You can use other collaborative tools such as Skype and Google Docs to help.

Mathematics

1. Steve has a very simple house with no windows and just a door 2 blocks high. The floor area of his house is 20 square meters. The capacity of his house (or the internal volume) is 80 cubic meters (each block in Minecraft is 1 cubic meter) What is the least number of blocks Steve could have used to build his house?
   Build Steve’s house.
   Using the same number of blocks,  is it possible to build Steve a house of the same height but with more volume?
2. A village in a Minecraft world is about to start farming. They have hired you to find out what is the most efficient way to get food-they are choosing between bread, cows and pigs. Use the Minecraftwiki to calculate which type of farming returns the most energy (food bars) for time spent farming.
3. Work out the minimum number of blocks you need to make a building with a volume of at least 75 cubic meters. Use Minecraft to test and improve your designs.
4. Work out the ratio of Minecraft time to real world time. (1 MC minute = real minutes?)

Computer Science

1. Use Java to create a mod for Minecraft
2. Create a texture pack for Minecraft

The Arts/Design

1. Compose the lyrics (English) and music for a national anthem for your Minecraft world.
2. Take a screen casting of your Minecraft world (or you could use timelapse screen shots of you building something), then use a program like Garageband to add music to your video. The music should fit the feel of your video. Here is an example

Minecraft ubiquitous learning

Today we read chapter 10 & 11 of 'City of Ember' and my students continued to build the city. We hit a road bump last Friday when we realized our cave wasn't high or wide enough. One of my Minecraft experts took it upon himself to utilise his lunchtime today and Friday to rebuild/configure the cave location so that the students had enough space to build their assigned buildings.

 We had finished the two chapters with 30 minutes to spare so I allowed the students to go for it and just let them have free run to finish their buildings. I then heard an excited yelp of glee when one boy shouted "Miss Downard, I have built a clock and it is attached to a light, did you know you can set the time and we can have the light go on and off whenever we want". My response to this was pure excitement, before I could even put the idea for how we could do this on a larger scale another of my students said "Miss, we can set clocks up with lights all around Ember and then we can make them go off at 9pm just like in the book" another student then jumped in and said "That is going to be really hard because we have to work it out over a 24 hour period". This is when I jumped in and began and impromptu math lesson on time. The students were so engaged because it meant something to them right then and there, and they could then use that knowledge to begin putting it to use.

I knew Minecraft offered learning opportunities but I didn't think it would begin presenting itself with so many awesome real and meaningful opportunities so early on. Here are some awesome screenshots of the 'City of Ember' that the students have built so far. I am already noticing the progression of their skills and creativity within this and I am thinking of other learning areas I can start integrating this into.