Minecraft Lesson Plans

These are some of the sample lesson plans that my students created this semester in MIT517 – Gaming and Simulations. This was an in class activity that gave students the opportunity to play minecraft and then create a lesson plan using the game. These are student created. I am going to copy and paste one here and attach a few others.

Lesson 1

*others can be downloaded here: 1)  Game.based_Lesson.plan 2) LessonPlanActivity 3) MinecraftLesson:

Minecraft Lesson Plan

Lesson Plan/Title:   A North Carolina Colonial Minecraft Village

Concept: Students will use Minecraft to demonstrate visualization and reading comprehension skills in context of Colonial history

Grade Level: 5th grade

General Goals: Students will develop their writing skills and reading comprehension in the context of NC colonial history.

Specific Objectives:

A. Given the 5th grade Social Studies textbook chapter on Colonial NC villages and other online resources, 5th grade students will be able to work with a partner to write several paragraphs clearly describing a Colonial village that fellow students can accurately recreate in Minecraft.

B. Given another student’s written description of a NC colonial village, the student pairs will be able to accurately visualize and generate a Colonial village in Minecraft.

Required materials

1. 5th grade NC Social Studies textbook

2. pad of paper

3. pencil

4. computer

5. Minecraft software installed, in creative mode

5. Flash drive to store Minecraft model

7. Previous experience using Minecraft – students should all be familiar with basic operations and comfortable creating structures

Instructional Strategy

This activity utilizes a Problem-Based Learning approach. Teachers should introduce the problem, provide resources to students, and provide support and guidance during the process. Students will be given the following problem statement:

You and your partner are North Carolina historians. The Minecraft History Museum wants a digital model of a typical North Carolina village from the Colonial era to include in their Colonial display. You have been chosen to design this village for Minecraft experts to build. You need to describe a typical NC colonial village in 2-3 paragraphs. Your description will be the only communication you have with the Minecraft building experts, so you must be sure to write clearly.

 

Teacher guide

Students should be somewhat familiar with material related to NC Colonial villages and life. This would not be an introductory activity, but a reinforcing activity integrated with on reading comprehension and clear writing.

Divide into groups of two and give them the problem statement focused on writing a description of a NC Colonial village to be designed by fellow students to be placed in The Minecraft History Museum.

Students can use the chapter on NC Colonial villages in their Social Studies book along with web resources to write a detailed description of the village. Students may also choose to model their own village using Minecraft, by drawing, or by any other method of their choice.

The students should have between 1 and 2 hours to research and write.

They will then exchange their descriptions with another group and begin to construct the village in Minecraft based on the description written by the other group.

Groups should have about 2 hours to build the model.

Closure

Groups will receive feedback from peers and discuss with their groups. Then class will come back together for a group discussed facilitated by the teacher using the following questions:

1. How clear were the descriptions from the other group?

2. What did you find to be helpful in the descriptions?

3. What do you think could have been written to help you in building the village more accurately?

4. Let’s discuss colonial village life and how accurately we were able to really build it.

Assessment

The teacher should show multiple examples of NC Colonial villages including Minecraft models, pictures, videos, etc. in order for students to understand how to assess if the written description is on topic and accurately describes a NC Colonial village. To assess the final products, groups will read the written descriptions and use the rubric below to grade the clarity of the description. Then groups will review the models and grade how well they follow the description using the rubric below. The teacher should also assess teamwork skills based on observations.

Written Description

Total Possible Points Yes No
Description is on topic (describes NC colonial village accurately) 20
Uses correct spelling and grammar 10
Describes at least 3 buildings 15
Houses
Number/ amount in a village 5
Color 5
One other style description 5
Stores or other building
Number/ amount in a village  5
Color 5
One other style description 5
Church or other building
Number/ amount in a village 5
Color 5
One other style description 5
Describes locations of the buildings relative to each other 10
Total 100

Model

Total Possible Points Yes No
Includes all described buildings 50
Buildings are in the correct locations 10
Buildings are correct described color 10
Number of building types are correct 10
Any other buildings descriptions are followed  10
Does not include extra distracting items 10
Total 100

 

Appendix:

* 5th Grade Social Studies textbook Chapter 4: North Carolina Colonial Villages

* Pictures of Colonial Villages :

https://www.google.com/search?q=pictures+of+nc+colonial+villages+in+the+17th+century&client=firefox-a&hs=2QG&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=fflb&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=fcYwU-_ZOMbr0gH6moCIBg&ved=0CCUQsAQ&biw=1440&bih=714#channel=fflb&q=pictures+of+nc+colonial+villages+in+the+18th+century&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&tbm=isch