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Microsoft Weaponizes Minecraft In the War Over Classrooms (backchannel.com)
Minecraft: Education Edition offers lesson plans like "City Planning for Population Growth" and "Effects of Deforestation," and a June preview attracted more than 25,000 students and teachers from 40 different countries. Slashdot reader mirandakatz writes: In the two years since Microsoft acquired Minecraft's parent company, it's discovered a brilliant new direction to take the game: it's turning it into a tool for education, creating both an innovative approach to classroom technology and an inspired strategy for competing with Google and Apple in the ed-tech market. 'I actually never believed there would be a game that would really cross over between the commercial entertainment market and education in a mainstream way,' says cultural anthropologist Mimi Ito—but Minecraft has managed to do just that.
In 2015 Chromebooks represented over 50% of PC sales for U.S. schools, while Windows PC accounted for just 22%, the article reports. But Minecraft is the second best-selling game of all time, behind only Tetris, and in the two years since Microsoft acquired it, "Sales have doubled to almost 107 million copies sold... If you were to count each copy sold as representing one person, the resulting population would be the world's 12th largest country (after Japan)." And as the article points out, "wherever Minecraft goes, Microsoft is there."
In 2015 Chromebooks represented over 50% of PC sales for U.S. schools, while Windows PC accounted for just 22%, the article reports. But Minecraft is the second best-selling game of all time, behind only Tetris, and in the two years since Microsoft acquired it, "Sales have doubled to almost 107 million copies sold... If you were to count each copy sold as representing one person, the resulting population would be the world's 12th largest country (after Japan)." And as the article points out, "wherever Minecraft goes, Microsoft is there."
I taught a Minecraft class last year at our school last year for 3rd-8th grade kids. They tolerated Minecraft EDU, but would rather just play on servers or in LAN world as a regular Minecraft Client.
They won't be having the class this year as the Education Edition requires them to upgrade their lab to Windows 10. They aren't going to do that and want linux in the classroom. Now that Education Edition requires W10 for both client/server, I no longer have any interest in the 'value add' of the EDU product.
I can almost appreciate the need for a W10 server, but requiring all clients to be on W10? No thanks.
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
You can build an 8-bit computer in minecraft. Red stone is basic logic gates. People have built fully automated tools and processes using very basic resources.
And frequently in rather unrealistic ways. Don't get me wrong -- I recognize Minecraft is a GAME and thus uses different logic from the real world. Like any game with some creative components, it allows users to figure out how to exploit the game rules to do interesting things.
I'm interested in what paint drying you're watching that teaches you that much about chemistry and thermo.
Hmm... well, let's see...
10 THINGS MINECRAFT TAUGHT ME ABOUT CHEMISTRY AND THERMO:
(1) Water comes in blocks and stays in blocks... sometimes. But when you carry it up a mountain in a round bucket and put a block of it on the ground, it spontaneously regenerates and can produce a giant waterfall.
(2) If I have two water "blocks," I can make infinite water forever.
(3) Water has a large enough viscosity that you can swim up a waterfall.
(4) Torches have a magical fuel source that can burn forever.
(5) For some reason, torches can't show light when you carry them, but will produce light forever when placed on a surface.
(6) Cows are magically able to produce unlimited amounts of milk.
(7) Weirdly, carnivorous diets are much more energy efficient than vegetarian diets. Animals somehow magically create more energy for consumption, the opposite of in the real world. (E.g., consider how many pieces of wheat it takes to breed a new cow (and how much energy/life you'd get by consuming that wheat) vs. how much energy/life you get when you slaughter the new cow and eat the meat.)
(8) Obsidian is a weirdly strong material rather than in the real world where it's a brittle glass that fractures under stress relatively easily.
(9) Chemistry of materials is apparently very sensitive to direction. If you let water flow in different directions toward molten rock (lava), you'll get at least four different outcomes.
(10) If you want electricity, you have to go out and find this stuff called "redstone," which can be mined and produce infinite sources of power. (And it behaves in all sorts of irrational ways.)
I could go on. And this doesn't even get into the nonsense "chemistry" of "potions", etc. in Minecraft, the fact that making anything is usually just a matter of some obscure placement of items in the correct positions (maybe roasting something in the oven), or the complete nonsense physics.
Meanwhile, by observing paint drying, particularly with decent tools and meters, I may be able to get a more realistic perspective precipitate and solid formation, realistic viscosity, polymer chemistry, effects of thermodynamics on evaporation and mass transfer, changes in reflection and frequencies of light interaction from pigments in various situations, etc.
Again, this is NOT a criticism of the game mechanics of Minecraft. But saying it "teaches" you stuff about chemistry and thermo isn't very accurate... it just "teaches" you how to play a game. Along the way, it might teach abstract logical skills -- the same way doing geometrical proofs, composing rote sentences in Latin, and other stuff people used to do did. I'm not advocating for the latter, just noting the kind of "knowledge" gained from Minecraft is more abstract -- learning to follow recipes, being creative within the arbitrary constraints of a system/world, utilizing resources wisely, etc.