Microsoft Moves To Make Learning Fun With 'Minecraft In Education' Initiative

Minecraft is a blockbuster game that has been played by millions around the globe, both young and old. The incredible popularity of the game is what prompted Microsoft to buy the game’s creator, Mojang, for $2.5 billion in late 2014.

And while Minecraft is can be seen as a game that allows players to dilly dally a virtual 3D world, the creative and building aspects of the game have been cultivated to help in learning environments. Over the years, Google’s Quantum AI Lab Team and MinecraftEdu joined forces to experiment with quantum physics. In March, an even deeper dive into the education sector   occurred when MinecraftEdu was made available to every secondary school in Northern Ireland.

Mojang is now further opening the doors to educators with Minecraft in Education, a new portal that will help broaden the the use of Minecraft as a tool to help students develop new skills for learning and solving problems.

“Many of the most fun parts of Minecraft, including the collaborative nature of play, the need to experiment, the open world, the earning of achievements, and the growth of players’ in-game characters as well as their personal skill sets, are also key to excellent learning environments,” wrote Mojang in a Tumblr post announcing Minecraft in Education. “Our goal here is to invite you to share possibilities. We’ve created this space to connect the community of educators and players with people looking to learn more.”

Mojang will again be working with MinecraftEdu along with Joel Levin and Santeri Koivisto from TeacherGaming. For now, the Minecraft in Education portal is rather light on details on how teachers can further use Minecraft in the classroom, and simply has an email signup link to learn more. For now, you can watch Mojang’s short video which introduces its latest attempt at empowering educators.