Finally Looking Forward

The past couple of weeks have been rough around the edges.  With the prospect of having someone else dictate my life looming over me (think: jury duty) I struggled to think ahead.  With the news that I'd been dismissed Saturday morning I jumped right into conversation with my awesome husband about ideas I have for the future.  Naturally, he lead the conversation towards Minecraft.  You see, I married a gamer.  He was curious if I had any great ideas that he could help me with.  Specifically: ideas to teach lessons through the Minecraft platform.

The first step I am planning on trying out is giving CJ his math assignment for the week on Minecraft.  He will be studying multiplication by 3's.  As an opened ended assignment he will need to demonstrate the multiplication equations of 3x1 through 3x10 (maybe higher, we'll just have to see how it goes).  This plan, though a great place to start, provided Steve with nothing to work on.  So we brainstormed more.  (A Minecraft snowman is a representation of 3x1 by the way.)

This week I'll be hosting a science class for my homeschool group.  The topic: Blood.  We'll be learning about the parts of blood and the key functions that blood carries out.  It is FULLY inspired by "The Bloodmobile" by They Might Be Giants.

Our conversation turned to the possibilities of creating a block body 100 blocks long with block organs. We discussed using dispensers to shoot out "oxygen" blocks and "hormone" blocks among other things that players could collect as they are acting as blood cells.  Players could then take their items to needy cells and the garbage dump (liver and/or kidneys).  

It's still a work in progress.  We started by taping quite a few graph pages together and then drawing out our model.  Minecraft Realms was the route we decided to go since we were struggling with hosting our own server and I can't get a MinecraftEdu account until I'm actually working for a school district.  I'm not sure how this lesson will develop and be utilized in the end.  However, I'm completely stoked about the possibilities and am using it as a learning experience for myself to create more engaging learning atmospheres for the future.  Wish me luck!