02 Dec 2020

A Minecraft Tale of Two Villages
Are you keen to get your students immersed in Minecraft this Hour of Code? This year’s Minecraft challenge will build your students' computational thinking skills and more.
What’s this year’s challenge?
This year’s Hour of Code Minecraft challenge for students is A Tale of Two Minecraft Villages – exploring themes of sustainability, community, storytelling and resilience. It’s also a chance to promote and demystify the art of coding.
What skills does the Minecraft challenge promote?
This virtual event is not only fun, it’s designed to promote the following skills in students:
problem-solving skills
critical thinking skills
developing empathy and understanding
collaboration
What does stem.T4L leader Andrew Balzer think?
Andrew says:
For centuries, Villagers and Illagers have shared a valley, but they have never got along. Learn basic coding concepts to bring these villages together! Minecraft Hour of Code is fast approaching and with it, comes A Tale of Two Villages which is a fantastic introductory coding lesson that is bound to get both students and teachers into the world of programming.
This world allows you to explore multiple scenarios that relate to moral and ethical choices, alongside computational thinking and problem solving and is one of the best tutorial worlds produced to support lateral thinking.
Each situation contains an individual story that encompasses multiple teaching concepts, everything from social emotional learning, to problem solving. By using the power of coding, students will be able to assist the village to return to its normal state!
In addition, the tutorials are well written and provide step-by-step instructions on how to use block based and general-purpose coding languages.
With visual tutorials and assistive learning tools such as immersive reader, Minecraft Education Edition: A Tale of Two Villages has something for every learner! It’s never too late to make the dive into the world of coding, so why not start by bringing together two communities through the power of code!
How do I get started?
Get everything you need from the Hour of Code: A Minecraft Tale of Two Villages.
1. Set up Minecraft: Education Edition
2. Get the Lesson Plan
3. Facilitate an Hour of Code at your school
4. Continue learning
For instructions on installing Minecraft Education Edition on NSW DoE computers access this intranet site.