Minecraft - the world is yours for the making

Together with Michele Di Paola, trainer, facilitator, youth worker and blogger living in Monza, Italy we are explore a platform that is a little bit different from all the others we have seen, because it is actually a videogame: Minecraft.

 

Minecraft is just the most sold videogame in history, so far... – says Michele. The game boasts ca. 141 million active accounts. It’s like the population of France, Italy and Czech Republic all in one! And it is a good piece of history. Minecraft was developed by a small independent studio in Sweden, actually by one single programmer, Markus Persson, who released it in 2011. Later it has been acquired by Microsoft for the outrageous (back then) amount of 2.5 billion US dollars in 2014.

 

Nowadays, the Minecraft is not really free to use. One has to purchase a user license. There are several versions around, the so-called Java edition is for PC and Mac is for 24 euros at the moment on its official website (minecraft.net), as well as on many different retail sites.  There are editions for game consoles, like PlayStation, or for mobile - but they are not mutually compatible. This means users who are connected via different platforms cannot meet and share the same experience. Everybody has to own a copy: educators, learners, everybody involved in a session.

 

This is a great commercial success, but it’s a barrier for those who want to use it for educational purposes. How does Michele overcome this challenge? I host summer camps - one week-events where I meet people every day for morning or afternoon sessions. In this case, it usually happens that all participants already have their own copies - but I have a number of paid copies that I lend to participants when in need. This is technically speaking a grey area, it’s not really clear if it can be considered “fair use” or not, but Michele’s point is clear: I paid for these copies, I can’t see how it can be a problem if I lend them for a week to somebody else, and then refresh passwords right after. We certainly hope nobody will ever start legal action to prevent this! 

 

Anyway, I really recommend every school or youth club that could be potentially interested to purchase their own licenses and make the game accessible to their users - continues Michele. One of the reasons why Microsoft bought Mojang studio back in the days was that the community developed a ‘mod’ (a user-made modification for the game which does not change its most fundamental aspects) that introduced “group control” features, like facilitation tools. Microsoft bought the game so they could release their own educational version of the game, within a closed system so that users were not able to modify it anymore. These special licenses for educational use were quite cheap, around 5 euros per user, and Microsoft also offered training for teachers. However this function doesn’t seem to be available right now. 

 

The visual aspects are iconic by now: blocky characters in a sandbox game (where you build your own experience each time, creating stuff from what is available). You can build very large worlds, potentially borderless connected to the physical machines that are hosting the game – says Michele.  

 

For youth work I do this: I create a parallel zoom session where I host ice breaking sessions and I create a team environment. Then I invite participants to the game sever that I have previously prepared. 10 to 15 people is the group size I would recommend for a good interactive session, based on my experience with different target groups – Michele shares his experience. Then I meet participants in the server. I leave the zoom room open so that people can still talk (you can’t speak in Minecraft) and ask questions to me if necessary. Then I give the group different challenges, for example building homes and creating a village, within a given time limit.

 

Like every game, there is a learning curve. Michele suggests that after one or two sessions (two to four hours) basically everybody is able to experience the game without any problems, and have fun. 

 

It is also possible that participants wander off or get lost in the environment. This is where the role of a facilitator becomes important. First of all I create a starting place for everybody, which means all characters appear in the same place within the game world. I also put a light beacon - like a torch reaching all the way up to the sky - or two or three of them close to one another, so people can see them from far away and always know where is the base camp.

 

All the computers connected to the same wifi will know that there is one common Minecraft session and will automatically join the same game. But sometimes Michele hosts online meetings where people are not physically together in the same space. How to do this? The easiest way is to create a Minecraft server dedicated to you, with five to ten euros per month you can have a dedicated server and invite all the players to join you (a free version exists too, but with limited options). Once you have a server you can create your own world, using templates that are provided for free. 

 

And some are really creative: creators have made copies of their favourite fictional universes within the Minecraft game world. One can find worlds dedicated to the Harry Potter, Star Wars or the Lord of the Rings setting. Michele estimates that 1 or 2 days of experience are enough for an educator or youth worker to be able to use Minecraft for educational purposes. The beauty of game systems like this is that they unleash participants’ creativity, often beyond a facilitator’s idea. Once Michele invited participants to bring their homes closer together, and they spent an entire day creating a railroad system to connect them - including the game’s version of electricity. An impressive engineering and teamwork feat! 

 

No doubt there are also technical issues. And the troubleshooting you have to do as a facilitator. Once I ended up talking to the 80-years old grandma of one participant who was experiencing technical issues with his laptop. And all the other participants were willing to help, too! – says Michele.

 

Especially during the pandemic, it became painfully clear that everybody was spending way too much time online. What is the point to encourage young people to spend even more time engaged in the virtual world, even when they can have alternatives? It’s not a matter of more time or less time, but of what we do in that time - replies Michele. For example you can place all the PCs together in the same room, all connected in a youth center space - there is a recent experience in Finland where young people have been asked to redesign the city plan using Minecraft. This is a way to use a videogame for educational purposes, while being physically together with other people, also having a social and civic experience. Of course then, after a two hours session indoors, take the group out to play in the field for another two hours. It’s not forbidden!. It’s important to try to achieve a balance. Maximum 2 hours duration for a session, and for example every thirty minutes it’s good to invite a group to make a short break, stand up and stretch a little, jump up and down, before going back to work. And this is a valuable tip not only for young people, but for everybody who is involved in digital work in front of a screen.