Create an Ancient Civ. Project - 6th grade

[cic...@mentorschools.org]

Hi!

 

I am new to the Minecraft world, but I have heard plenty of good things to be intrigued.  My 6th grade social studies class has been studying ancient civilziations since January (Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, India).  We particularly look at the agriculture, government, religion, and scientific/cultural contributions of these civilizations with an emphasis on the rivers as an important way for civilizations to begin.  At the end of the year, we always have created our own ancient civilization using what we have learned.  I think Minecraft lends itself well to this type of project, and I got approval from my principal to try it.  Problem is, not sure where to begin!!  Anyone do a similar project with their classes?  I am attaching the guidelines to the OLD project to get a better idea of what I am looking to do using Minecraft.

 

THANK YOU in advance for any ideas, support, or help!  Again, I am new and never have played, but looking to have some students inservice me :-)

[Dan Thalkar]

I'm in the middle of a similar project with my 7th graders. We started out by exploring Eric's World of Humanities which, if you haven't checked out yet, is definitely the place you should start. Students chose a civilization and thoroughly explored it, putting together the different facets of a civilization. After that, we jumped into the main phase, wherein students create their own civilizations from scratch in survival mode.

I split the kids into teams, then assigned each team an island with a different biome (desert, mountains, forest, swamp, wintery place). Each island is heavy in one resource but very limited in others (lots of wood, but no metal). They then had to use the resources available to them to a) survive and b) create their own civilizations meeting the requirements established during the World of Humanities period. I've attached the handouts we're currently using, if those can be of use to you.

Next week the kids start trading with each other, and I plan to record the process, so I'll let you know once it's up on my blog.

Dan.

[cic...@mentorschools.org]

Thanks, Dan! That definitely will help me get started. I will most likely have more questions once I get it up and running nice I have never played. I am watching videos for tutorials. Looking forward to trying this out!

[Eric]

I had never really thought of this before, but yes, my map can serve as a good introduction to teachers as well as students. I think it is structured in such a way that it introduces controls, and shows many examples of possibilities of what can be done in Minecraft and MinecraftEdu. Let me know how it works out for you!

[Martin Andersson]

Dan! Your work sounds great. I am starting working with Minecraft with my students. I want to do just what you are doing, putting them on islands and make them work together. I have not been able to use Erics world but I will get my stunts to help me set it up. I have down loaded it but still dont know how to get i on to my pc that we use as the server. How do you create the island that you place your students on? Do you have a tutorial?

Best regards Martin Andersson, Sweden

[cic...@mentorschools.org]

Same question, Dan.  How do you go about creating islands with different biomes?  Do you create separate maps for each?  Again, I'm a newbie at this, and my only experience has been watching tutorials.  I'm getting excited when thinking of all the possibilities though!

[Lisa Douthit]

This is all very exciting to find!  We just started a minecraft server in our computer lab and began a project with 6th grade to build civilization side by side in one world.  We started them with the world tutorial and they will begin choosing their site to build and begin working on Friday, April 19.  We have 4 expert 8th grade mentors who will follow them in-world and have set up residences as teachers in the world in addition to a teacher resource building.  For now we are only using an in-school offline server.  I know we are going to learn much from this experience since it is our first. I love seeing the different thought flows here.  I attached our assignment sheet that will most likely change as we go through the project. 

[Michael Rose]

This week I hope to get our class building Noah's Ark.

To scale, and with animals of course.

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[cic...@mentorschools.org]

This sounds great!  Please keep me updated with the progress of your project.  I won't be starting mine until mid-May, so I would love to hear how yours is going.  I will share my experiences when I am up and running.