Microsoft Corporation

Minecraft EDU Journey Course Refresh

Creating pedagogically relevant and engaging collaborative teaching and learning experiences for an introductory course about Minecraft: Education Edition.

Challenge

Microsoft invested significant effort in tailoring the wildly successful game Minecraft into an education specific version, Minecraft: Education Edition. The education edition made it easier for educators and students across the globe to use the product as a platform for engaging, collaborative teaching and learning experiences. However, while the product is very popular with students, scaling adoption and implementation beyond tech-savvy educators to reach a larger education audience proved challenging. Microsoft wanted to improve the My Minecraft Journey course and training materials so that more educators could gain experience and confidence using Minecraft across the curriculum.

Solution

Our team evaluated which components of the existing My Minecraft Journey course and training materials would be suitable for adaptation and extension and determined how much new content would need to be developed. The Clarity team then redesigned the course into a learning experience that is more firmly rooted in best practices and sound pedagogical strategy as opposed to one that is focused primarily on teaching the mechanics of game play. The course was launched in time for the annual 2019 ISTE conference and has been taken by approximately three thousand users per month.