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This page contains examples of what other teachers have created with MinecraftEdu. The examples range from fully fledged lesson plans to classroom blogs. If you want to submit your blog or other resource for the page, hit feedback link at the bottom of the page!

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This wiki is devoted to hosting ideas, lessons, implementation strategies and more related to using the game, Minecraft in a school setting

Whether you use it in a computer/gaming club, as part of your regular curricular instruction, or even at home with your own children, Minecraft's simple yet scalable "sandbox" virtual environment can be an excellent tool for engaging student learning. The open-ended nature of the game lends it to application in a variety of subject areas. Game-based learning, virtual worlds, and simulations are emerging tools for reaching our learners.

That's why this wiki was created. Are you an educator who also plays Minecraft? Perhaps you're considering using the game in your school or district. Do you have ideas about how Minecraft could enrich your teaching while providing a fun and exciting game world for your students? Then join us and share those ideas! This is an opportunity for crowd-sourced lesson building!

- Lucas Gillispie, Director of Academic and Digital Learning, Surry County Schools.

Recent News

(6/30/17) - Here's an updated Minecraft Survival Challenge (version 2.0) - It's been updated with new quests and all-game-based Community Challenges!
New Mini Games
Castle Wars - A TNT-Cannon, Team-based challenge. (world download link inside)

The Driving Range - A TNT-Cannon range game designed to teach the basics of cannon design. (world download link inside)

(11/10/15) - Here's a Sustainable Community Project we're working on at Gentry Middle School. It focuses on sustainable, green building in different regions of North Carolina.

(6/1/15) -Alice Keeler (@alicekeeler) is awesome, but you knew that, right? She has taken my Minecraft Survival Challenge and has created this amazing, interactive spreadsheet - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wV95txxZeRvDrlUlgrpOe5VBHyxJMsHiIKQ9ybqhLTs/copy (this link will prompt you to make your own copy).

(2/11/13) - Major updates to the Hosting Your Own Server page and the Accounts and Account Management page to reflect the current status of the project and to provide more detailed tips for other schools who wish to get involved.

(12/18/13) - Great tutorial video on how to level in mcMMO by Aidan. Check it out!

(12/8/13) - Lots to share! First off, this month, we launch our first Community Challenge created by one of our student miners, Countdown to MineChristmas. This project, developed by Hayate12, celebrates the holidays with an Advent-styled challenge to rebuild Santa's village, with new components added daily.

We have a number of tutorials added by our community in recent weeks:

Minecrafter, Wandser, shares this tutorial on how to utilize hoppers:

Minecrafter deerhunter0 has shared a brief guide on how to invert redstone and use it to create a lamp that will turn on at night with a daylight sensor:
Inverted Restone
(11/15/13) - Our elementary learners will be participating in the Minecraft City Construction Challenge as they learn about urban, suburban, and rural regions. Ideally, this experience would allow them to discuss and handle the city zoning, but since their time is so limited, that was set up ahead of time. Should be exciting to see what they create!

(11/3/13) - Our November event has launched! Redstonia! Details are here - http://goo.gl/8AJIZu

(10/18/13) - One of our awesome Minecrafters created this great video showing off our survival world:

(10/2/13) - Gillispie - So, Minecraft is rocketing in Pender County Schools! More schools are getting involved. Topsail Middle just launched their Minecraft club, initially, a fully online club, and it's booming! Welcome to all of the new faces!

We also launched our first monthly server event last night, The Town of Deadwood! The Town of Deadwood is a community build event in which all players are invited to assist in the building of a haunted (and deserted) town (in the spirit of Halloween). It should be exciting! Want to see our announcement flyer? You can find it here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/16Ry36DMAIarAKirE-3UECM6tCmDfubZ6s9Seu8r-iPk/edit. I can't wait to see what they create!

(10/1/13) - Gillispie - This year, our Survival server has had a makeover. We've relaunched it with some exciting new changes. First off, though Towny was a fun plugin, the majority of players seemed to want to go back to a more "vanilla" survival experience. So, this year, we launched a brand new world with a great seed ( link here). We created a brand new server ranking system and are actively exploring ways to gamify (and learn-ify) the experience. We've added the MCMMO plugin that lets players "level up" skills like mining, archery, etc., and have implemented a new "Guide" program in which students can be nominated by a teacher to be a server Guide, indicated that they are "helpers" for new players. My amazing build team from Pender Early College High has been providing great assistance in building our server spawn area, a town called SpringHaven (pictured below). Our biggest goal this year? Building community! To that end, we're planning monthly events including contests and community builds. It should be exciting!

(8/1/13) - Gillispie - Here's a link to The Minecraft Survival Quest Challenge -a series of challenges, gamified, for players on a survival server - https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qP88dNh9ESz0K4Tkej2A1rt3xPkEWvywB5VNzYIQ1FQ/edit?usp=sharing

(7/23/13) - Gillispie - Handy crafting guide for those just getting started out in Survival Mode - http://deathdigger.free.fr/Crafting.pdf

(6/2/13) - Gillispie - Exciting to be sharing our students' creations at the e-Virtuoses serious games conference in Valenciennes, France this week!

(1/7/13) - Gillispie - Looking for an interesting way to integrate the fun of Minecraft with learning about elements from the periodic table? What if you could create items, in-game, with those elements? Sara Toothman has created a great lesson that encourages students to imagine! Get it here - Elemental Minecraft.pdf.

(1/3/13) - Gillispie - If you haven't seen Sara Toothman's video of her students' creations in Minecraft in the Fall, check it out!

(11/20/12) - Gillispie - Added more information to our Bukkit Plugins Page about the plugins we're using on our Creative and Survival Servers.

(10/4/12) - Gillispie - Added a section for Sara Toothman's resources for Minecraft! - Sara Toothman's Awesome Minecraft Resources

(6/19/12) - Gillispie - Added a Cost and Budget page to assist with budgeting for your own education-related projects. Updated Hosting Your Own Server with more resources and added a Bukkit and Plugins page to share information about the plugins we're currently using on our Bukkit servers in PCS.

(6/13/12) - Gillispie - Creativity begets creativity...

So, our Minecraft projects are spawning new, creative game-based learning projects in our schools! Take a look at Sara Toothman's Kickstarter project to bring more game-based learning to her students at West Pender Middle School! While you're at it, why not pledge $5 to make it happen?

(4/24/2012) - Gillispie - Here's a video showing off some student and teacher creations:

(4/2/2012) - Gillispie - In addition to our first Minecraft explorers, Minecraft projects are now underway at Burgaw Middle School , Pender Early College High School, and soon Heidi Trask High and Cape Fear Middle School. Exciting times!

(1/25/12) - Gillispie - So much going on since my last update. So, here's what's new:
PCS Minecraft Grants
Pender County Schools offered its teachers the opportunity to apply for a Minecraft grant which would cover 25 student licenses to the game. Teachers simply had to explain how they'd use the game and connect it with their curriculum. Here's the reference page I created for the application process. The three schools that won grants include: Topsail Elementary School, Cape Fear Middle School, and Pender Early College High School. We're excited to be bringing new learners into our Minecraft learning community.
West Pender Middle Launches Their Minecraft Program Today
Sara Toothman, Art Teacher at West Pender Middle will be launching their Minecraft program today! Students will be using the game to explore a variety of concepts including journaling/creative writing, 8-bit art, structures/building, and more. We're really looking forward to seeing what our kids create!
5th Graders from Topsail Elementary School's Second Year Program Share Their Creations
These kids did phenomenal work. It was awesome to work with these guys as many of them had their first experiences in Minecraft. Take a look at what they created:

(12/6/11) - Gillispie - Here's a great example of using Minecraft for modeling a concept. Notice the level of engagement, here. Do you think these kids "get it?" Also, looks like he's running MinecraftEDU's server! Awesome!

(12/5/11) - Gillispie - There was a great panel discussion on called Minecraft As A Tool For Education - Minecon Panel 2011.

(11/22/11) - Gillispie - Great fan-made advertisement for Minecraft. This pretty much captures the essence of the game.

(11/4/2011) - Gillispie - So many projects going on that I've neglected updates here. So, here's what's up: Sara Toothman of West Pender Middle School here in Pender County has won a grant to start their own Minecraft project. This project funded by the Bright Ideas program will allow us to purchase a Mac Mini Server and 25 Minecraft accounts for the school. Our YouTube video from last year has exploded recently in the number of views (over 17,000 as of this post). I really appreciate the comments, mostly from students from around the world. Remember, learning doesn't have to be boring!! MinecraftEdu launched today!!!

(8/11/2011) - Gillispie - Come to Games in Education 2011 in New York, August 22 - 23, to learn more about Minecraft and how it's being used in schools!

(8/8/2011) - Gillispie - Development of our Minecraft Project for Pender County Schools is underway. Currently developing a small curriculum in 3DGameLab!

(7/1/2011) - Gillispie - Check out the emerging community of educators using Minecraft at Massively Minecraft - http://socialmediaclassroom.com/host/MassivelyMinecraft/

(6/8/2011) - Gillispie - Our students showing off their work:

(6/3/2011) - Gillispie - Our test project here in Pender County Schools is wrapping up. Here's a slideshow of some of the students' creations. You can click on the slideshow to view larger versions of the images:

(4/16/2011) - Groom - Disaster as Mr10 builds a rather great build, only to die in lava and respawn unable to re-locate. So ... I've been looking

at http://www.minecraftforum.net/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=100267#preview

Which is a n00bish cheat, however, with WorldEdit, you'd be able to map spaces for specific learning instances and build fast.

(4/15/2011) - Gillispie - Added a guide for setting up a local Minecraft server in Ubuntu to Hosting Your Own Server, written by one of our techs, Loren Macon.

(4/8/2011) - Gillispie - Day 1 Reflections of PCS Minecraft Project here - http://edurealms.com/?p=363

(4/6/2011) - Gillispie - Excited to welcome a number of new folks to the wiki. It's very exciting to see a community of practice forming! There's a growing momentum thanks to Joel's work and the publicity it's received.

(4/5/2011) - Gillispie - Added a Skins, Mods, and Texture Packs page. I added some information to the Skins section based on my experiences, but could use assistance with the Mods and Texture Packs sections since I've not yet attempted those. Also added a Games in Education Resources and Research section with resources on getting started and supporting research.

(4/4/2011) - Gillispie - Created skins for the students at both schools to use using MCSkinEdit ( read more here). Set up male/female versions and matched "uniforms" to school colors! Fun!

(4/1/2011) - Gillispie - Great article about Joel Levin's work with second graders in Minecraft at KQED's MindShift - Legos for the Digital Age: Students Build Imaginary Worlds. Check out Joel's reflections on his work at his blog, The Minecraft Teacher.

(3/23/2011) - Gillispie - Moving forward! Check out Melanie McBride's excellent Explorer's Journal for Minecraft learners. It's great. Also, I learned this morning that one of our amazing PCS techs is writing up a step-by-step on setting up your own Linux-based Minecraft server like we did. Woot!

(3/21/2011) - Gillispie - Added PCS Test Run - Lesson Ideas page. We begin our first use with students (sort of a beta phase?) on April 8th. The approach with our 5th graders will be somewhat less structured.

(3/19/2011) - Gillispie - Check out Rob Newberry's reflections on using Minecraft in an education setting - Learning With Minecraft.

(3/16/2011) - Gillispie - Worked through issues preventing the game from launching on our district Dell 330 computers. Updating the graphics drivers fixed the error we were getting at launch. Added a Computer and Software Considerations page with a few more details. Updated Accounts and Account Management page with suggestions. "Ned," our internal Minecraft server was launched today and seems to be working very well.

(3/11/2011) - Gillispie - It looks like we may have a trial launch for 5th(?) graders in early April, running Fridays until the end of the year. Very exciting. We're currently working out the scheduling logistics and logistics with server hosting. More details to come.

(3/9/2011) - Gillispie - Added several pages, though content needs to be added. Feel free to edit where you feel comfortable.

(3/9/2011) - Gillispie - Minecraft in School Wiki is launched! Now to find more contributors!
Minecraft and all of the screenshots are property of Mojang. Go buy the game! You'll love it.

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This wiki is devoted to hosting ideas, lessons, implementation strategies and more related to using the game, Minecraft in a school setting Whether you use it in a computer/gaming club, as part of your regular curricular instruction, or even at home with your own children, Minecraft's simple yet scalable "sandbox" virtual environment can be an excellent tool for engaging student learning.

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We work closely with the educator community to provide a library of lesson plans that can help apply Minecraft: Education Edition to a variety of teaching and curriculum needs. These lesson plans are available in the Class Resources area of the website, and we'll continue to add more in the months ahead.
Creating Lessons
Creating a lesson in Minecraft: Education Edition is not complicated, but it does require some planning. You probably have experience creating lesson plans for your students, now it is time to bring them to life in Minecraft: Education Edition. Here is a checklist of things you'll need to create your lesson. Click on the links to be provided with tips for each step of your lesson creation journey.

There are several locations available to create a lesson, but we will be using the most common: the dashboard method. To reach your dashboard, log in to the website and visit the "Classroom" tab.

Select "My Resources".

Scroll down to your dashboard.

Any purple button saying "+ create a new lesson" will get you to the lesson submission stage.
Photo
We provide a few standard photos, but the best way to make your lesson stand out to others is to provide a screenshot within your Minecraft-based (or adapted for Minecraft) lesson world.

Image via Class Village, Rebecca Elliott

Using Creative Mode, hit SPACE and fly above your world to take a picture with in-game tools or a screenshot utility

Experiment with different times of day, if appropriate to your world

Removing the heads-up display (HUD) with F1 can help with a clear picture.

Lighting can come from a variety of resources within the Minecraft world. Try being creative with lighting in your world for different results.

If you have connected lessons in a series, you may want to use similar images to signify they belong together, but it is not required.

Things to avoid

Lots of text in your image - because of the way images scale on various devices, your text may be unreadable at certain resolutions

Default images

Low contrast images

Title
Creating a good title for your lesson makes the difference between lessons that are seen often, and lessons that are hard to find by other educators. They should be specific, easy to understand, and simple.
Short Description
The description field is kept deliberately short but should not just be the first part of your introduction repeated. It is only seen one time so first impressions are important.

Use active verbs, for example: "Explore, create, & sustain life on an alien planet"

You can also try asking a question that is answered by the lesson, such as "Waking up in a strange world, can you breakout?"

Are you finding it difficult to edit your description down to the allotted characters? Try answering the following question: "If I wanted to tell people on social media (Twitter, Facebook) about my lesson, how would I accomplish this in a short, accurate, and exciting way?" This works because on social media because the limits are quite strict.

Things to avoid

Phrases like "in this lesson"

Abbreviations, slang, and other jargon (whenever possible)

Introduction
Think of this area as a longer description, designed for people who have already clicked through to view your lesson. You can make a reinforcing statement about your lesson (like in " Climate Change ") or go in depth to elaborate your original short description, for example:

Short description: Explore and create stories in The Baddlands

Introduction: Students can explore the rich story setting and use it as a platform on which to build and develop their own characters, settings, and events.
Student Ages
You can click more than one box here, but if you find yourself checking all the boxes, perhaps consider using "all ages" instead.
Subjects
You can select up to a maximum of three subject areas.

Student Ages and Subjects are currently the filters you can set on the " Find a Lesson " page to filter lessons. Make it easy for your lesson to be found by using them.
Skills
You can select up to a maximum of three skill areas.
Lesson Language
This drop-down defaults to English, but we accept lessons in other languages.
Learning Objectives
A well-defined learning objective defines the rest of the activity. You can add as many as you need by using + ADD LEARNING OBJECTIVE. They will show up as a bullet point list in your lesson.
Guiding Ideas and Questions
Providing guiding ideas and questions helps provide context for the lesson, and occasionally can provide suggestions for other educators using your lesson.
Student Activities
This section is designed to outline the exact steps needed by students to meet the learning objectives. Student Activities should also demonstrate or suggest how to use Minecraft to achieve these objectives, and often refer to the supporting files area on the right side of the lesson when published.
Performance Expectations

How will you measure student success?

What standards are used to know if the learning objectives are met?

Note: Each of these sections provide you with a rich text editor (so you can paste in your lesson from your word processor), and 3000 characters.
External References
If you have websites or videos that support your lesson, these would be a good place to link those. Please be careful linking to external resources you did not create, as content may change without notice.
Supporting Files
This is where you upload things like .mcworlds (these should be placed in ZIP files), PDFs, and documents. Be sure to describe all of them clearly with filenames that are distinct.

Congratulations, your lesson is now complete! What's next? Save as Draft
If you don't have time to finish your lesson, please save it as a draft and come back to it later. If for any reason you are not finished and have trouble editing, let our team know.
Submit for Review
Once a lesson is submitted, it goes through two steps by our community team.

First, it is reviewed for completeness, and the links (if any) are tested, and the files are downloaded to ensure they are compatible with Minecraft: Education Edition. Please make certain your files can be used on the supported platforms for Education Edition. Please be sure your email on your profile is up to date, in case we need to contact you about broken links or other missing information.

Next, your lesson is reviewed by our Curriculum specialists on the team. They will provide feedback if needed to improve your lesson for our world-wide community.

General Tips

Lesson plans are available for free on the Minecraft: Education Edition website.

Check your lesson for feedback and make adjustments as needed.

Be patient and plan in advance! Turnaround time for posting lessons can vary through the school year, although we try to provide initial feedback within two (2) weeks of submission for complete lessons.

We are always looking at ways to improve the lesson submission process, and as educators, your input is valuable to us. Please post your feedback in the feature request section of the website, or send it to support. Either way, we look forward to hearing from you and seeing your community contributions soon. Thank you for supporting Minecraft: Education Edition!
Additional Resources

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Minecraft: Education Edition Lesson Plans | Minecraft: Education Edition

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We work closely with the educator community to provide a library of lesson plans that can help apply Minecraft: Education Edition to a variety of teaching and curriculum needs. These lesson plans are available in the Class Resources area of the website, and we'll continue to add more in the months ahead.

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Using Minecraft in the education: A compilation of my favourite classroom projects

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Introduction - Latitude and longitude can be a tough concept to teach. It's one thing to understand the basic concept of the grid, but it's another to apply this knowledge to locations on a real map. This lesson will teach students to locate coordinates on a map and then navigate to them in the Minecraft world.

I Can Statement - I can understand and apply the concept of latitude and longitude.

Pre-Lesson activities - This lesson assumes that students have already been introduced to the basic concepts of latitude and longitude. The teacher should begin the lesson by reviewing these concepts, including the compass rose, equator, prime meridian, and the general ideas of which way the lines run. Students will then divide into 2-6 teams for the lesson. Teams can be whatever size the teacher decides and can even run across multiple classes.

Students will get a paper handout with a list of 26 treasure coordinates and a gridded map of the world. The teacher should give the students a few minutes to devise a strategy and plot a few coordinates.

The activity - In the Minecraft map, students will start out on top of a giant pyramid on a map with a latitude-longitude grid in the sky. Each student will be able to get a map and a compass from dispensers at the pyramid. Students will have a 20-minute (or longer at teacher's discretion) time frame to collect as many of the items they can. Each location features a command block that gives the item, so there is no danger of running out of items.

To help the students navigate, there are two in-game navigation aids. The first is a giant latitude-longitude grid in the sky. The equator and prime meridian are both numbered in increments of ten. The second navigation aid is a series of information blocks with signs that tell the student's current coordinates.

The treasure locations are in various locations. Each has a unique treasure. The command block that dispenses the treasures are sometime in plain view and sometimes hidden. Some may be in trees, some may be down stairs or underground. Students should not have to dig to get to the treasures. There is a spreadsheet with the coordinates and treasure types to help the teacher.

Interactive Activity/Group Practice - Students will work in their groups to find as many of the locations as they can and return the items to their color-coded team chests on top of the pyramid. It's a good idea to have a checklist of items and to have students show the teacher the item when they get it back to the pyramid. This prevents poaching of items from chests.

The teacher will monitor using the MinecraftEdu teacher mod to jump between students and observe their progress. The teacher can freeze students when necessary to explain a point. If students become stuck, the teacher can teleport them to another location.

Independent Practice/ Homework - Students will write a reflection on how their group worked as a team. Other possible post-game activities could include:

Handouts -

Latitude-Longitude Navigation Challenge student handout (contains coordinates and map)

Treasure locations - this spreadsheet contains the location and treasure type at each coordinate.

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Introduction - Latitude and longitude can be a tough concept to teach. It's one thing to understand the basic concept of the grid, but it's another to apply this knowledge to locations on a real map. This lesson will teach students to locate coordinates on a map and then navigate to them in the Minecraft world.

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This page contains examples of what other teachers have created with MinecraftEdu. The examples range from fully fledged lesson plans to classroom blogs. If you want to submit your blog or other resource for the page, hit feedback link at the bottom of the page!

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Students will enter the Biome Challenge Map. Each student will get the opportunity to visit the 5 biomes.

Biomes will include:

Zoologists - Who will explain their career and present the biome challenge

Animals:

Students will explore the biome to look for patterns that are noticeable by making observations. Students will also interact with a zoologist in the biome to learn addition information about that animals that live there. This is when/where students will read texts and use media to determine patterns of behaviors.
Use minecraft to gain the information
Students will use reading strategies and behaviors to learn about the effects of animal behaviors on the environment. The strategies used most for this unit will include using illustrations and specific images that enhance the learning experience for the reader. It is also essential that students practice asking and answering questions to help determine the meaning of words and phrases in a text. Finally, students will enhance their skills by asking and answering questions about key details in a text, visual, or print.
Essential Questions Grade 1:

How do plants/animals protect themselves from predators?

How do humans mimic plants/animals in order to survive?

How do parents help offspring survive?

How do offspring communicate their needs?

Grade 2:

Why do certain animals live in specific habitats?

Why can't animals survive in any kind of habitat?

What kind of plants can we find in certain environments?

How are habitats different and alike?

Procedure:

Explain the lesson objectives. For 1st Grade, pass out the Biome Challenge Field Tool. Explain that students will use this tool to gather their research in the biomes. For 2nd grade, pass out the Biome Challenge Field Report. Explain to students that they will need to document thier research they gather in the biome using the simple mind app. Research should include specific observations about the biome including plants, food, living space, and animal survival. This information will be used to complete the report.

Students will enter the minecraft map and travel through the woods to the stone biome challenge labrynth. They will travel to Biome Challenge 1. After stepping on the pressure switch, students can enter the 1st biome. Inside the Biome is a Zoologist. Students will explore the biome and ask the zoologist about their background and their biome challenge. Once all students have solved the challenge, award them by giving them multiple cacti. Repeat this through each area giving the student the following rewards as they complete - Cave - Mycelium, Artic - Snow, Ocean - Sand/Water Bucket, Farm - Hay/Planks. These rewards can be modified as needed.

After completing all 5 challenges, students will pass through the gated field and enter the sunset at the back of the last biome. The path leads to an open environment where students can create their own habitat for a chosen animal using the materials they have gained and materials they find in the area.

Students will complete the written portion of their grade specific field tool.

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Students will enter the Biome Challenge Map. Each student will get the opportunity to visit the 5 biomes. Biomes will include: Zoologists - Who will explain their career and present the biome challenge Animals: Students will explore the biome to look for patterns that are noticeable by making observations.