Impact of computer science

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, computer science careers are expected to grow by over 600,000, a 15 percent increase, by 2031. Unfortunately, computer science courses are not available for all learners in US schools. Presently, only 53 percent offer computer science courses.

The curriculum and training offered by Minecraft: Education Edition provide an entry point for schools and educators to adopt and teach CS curriculum. Designed for learners from pre-literacy through high school, Minecraft’s CS progression offers opportunities for students to develop computational thinking and practice both block-based coding and Python. It is built on three tenants that guide the code building experience.

• Drive meaningful learning through integrating real-world issues in immersive, imaginative worlds
• Prepare for digital future by developing computational thinking skills with in-game coding and curriculum
• Build social-emotional skills like empathy and learn digital citizenship

Code Builder is an in-game coding feature that integrates with Microsoft MakeCode and Azure Notebooks, providing an easy, drag and drop canvas for students to create programs to run in Minecraft. The MakeCode interface within Code Builder offers step-by-step directions as students get started so they can become accustomed to various blocks and ways they can customize them; it’s a fun and easy way to learn the basics.

Check out Code Builder in action for this delightful introductory lesson in block coding with MakeCode.

Get set up to code in Minecraft: Education Edition

To introduce coding into the classroom with Minecraft, use this three-part process:

1. Get set up

Before introducing coding to students, build your own foundation. Remember, you don’t have to be a coding or Minecraft expert. It’s as easy as downloading and installing Minecraft: Education Edition onto your device, trying a simple demo lesson with Hour of Code, and exploring training opportunities.

If you’re new to coding, open the app and try the Hour of Code demo lesson. You’ll learn how to code using blocks with Microsoft MakeCode, the starting point for students too. Go beyond that first hour with easy starter lessons, professional development, or classroom challenges.

Minecraft: Education Edition offers more than 25 hours of free online trainings designed for educators to teach Computer Science. If you’re totally new to Minecraft, start with the Minecraft Teacher Academy, 3 1-hour modules on how to use Minecraft with educational strategies for classroom integration. Check out the 1-hour free online training Intro to Coding with Minecraft to bring coding into your classroom with confidence.

2. Teach with Minecraft

Once you’ve explored the basics on your own, you’ll be ready to teach coding lessons. Minecraft: Education Edition offers a CS progression for primary to secondary learners, helping progress students from block-based coding to Python with standards-based content. With 200 hours of CS content for all levels and abilities, you’re sure to find what you need. Each lesson includes educator resources, rubrics, and Minecraft files to help students have fun while developing computer science skills.

If you’ve done Hour of Code already and are ready for the next step, start with Computing with Minecraft, a 30-hour, 10-unit set of materials based on CSTA standards that teaches learners about conditionals, functions, coordinates, and more in block-based coding.

Here are some other example lessons that utilize Code Builder to teach computational thinking:

• Hour of Code: Escape Estate is the latest one-hour intro to coding lesson in the annual Hour of Code series. Students complete puzzles with code to escape a mysterious mansion.
• Compute a Zoo challenges students to use block-based code to create a zoo entrance and animal enclosures.
• Sea Turtle Assistance bridges biology, ecology, and computer science as students use algorithms to help protect sea turtles.
• In Python 101: Lesson 9, students decompose problems and write code to design a game.

In addition to lesson plans, Minecraft: Education Edition features regular build challenges that engage students’ creativity and strengthen 21st-century skills. Here are two fun Code Builder challenges:

• Harvest Time has students take on multiple tasks to improve harvesting efficiency and then use creative coding skills to carve a pumpkin.
• In Number Line Railroad, students explore the relationship between numbers by completing a number line and connecting the railroad segments.

3. Find your community

Visit the Community page to join Minecraft: Education Edition’s global community of educators and peer mentors. Meet and learn from passionate educators, gain access to new lessons and teaching resources, find upcoming events, and bring immersive learning to your students.

Connect with the experts within your classroom to help you explore teaching with Minecraft. Schools around the country, including Atlanta Public Schools, have established Student Ambassador programs where students serve as Minecraft experts for educators and peers. Sign up for an upcoming Student Ambassador training cohort or take the free online course on Microsoft Learn.

Celebrate computer science with Hour of Code

Another exciting way to bring Code Builder into the classroom is through Minecraft Hour of Code, a series of fun, engaging coding tutorials for any learner—including educators and parents! Hour of Code is a global initiative designed to demystify coding and broaden participation in the field of computer science.

In the newest Minecraft tutorial, Hour of Code: Escape Estate, students learn basic coding concepts to escape a mysterious mansion by dawn. Along the way they will solve puzzles using computational thinking to unlock secrets, open trap doors, and reveal hidden clues. Minecraft Hour of Code is available as a free demo lesson, so anyone can download and play.

Check out the trailer to the new Minecraft Hour of Code!

Minecraft: Education Edition helps students prepare for the future by prioritizing digital fluency skills, promoting community, encouraging a coding mindset, and teaching computational thinking. Begin your computer science journey today!

The post Anyone can teach coding with Minecraft appeared first on Microsoft Education Blog.

That’s why we’re looking forward to seeing so many of you in person at ISTE 2022 from June 26 to June 29 in New Orleans and virtually. At Microsoft, our vision for education is to empower every student on the planet to achieve more. This year at ISTE, we will feature partners in the Microsoft booth that embody this spirit through our four pillars.

Pillar One: Accelerate Learning

Real-time data insights can accelerate learning and support career and workforce development. The following partners and their solutions are leading the way.

Beedle is designed for teachers to manage all aspects of their work, within one simple app, within Microsoft Teams. The app features tools and resources tailored to the modern educator’s daily needs, bringing powerful teaching and engaging functionality to Microsoft Teams. It helps educators save time, engage more easily with parents, and support their students’ overall success—all through a single, familiar platform.  

Canva for Education makes it easy to create, collaborate, and communicate visually in the classroom and beyond. It’s 100% free for K-12 teachers and their students. Canva also integrates with Teams and has a large collection of editable Flipgrid backgrounds and frames.

Classter is designed to allow educational institutions to manage student data in an all-in-one school and learning management solution. Its cloud-based architecture provides flexibility for hybrid learning environments and different modes of teaching.

ClickView uses leading industry technology, innovative curation, data, and customer insights to transform learning experiences through video. Students and teachers can access visually stunning, curriculum-aligned video content and an interactive interface for questions and assessments.

Dugga is an all-in-one assessment platform for teachers. It has exams, tests, quizzes, and assignments all in one place so that teachers can create, schedule, and grade exams seamlessly. With Dugga, schools can provide equal assessment opportunities, which is crucial for every student’s learning process.

Edword from EasyCorrect is an online toolbox that makes feedback on written work more engaging. It transforms the way students learn and work while helping teachers save time. Teachers can follow students’ progress, learn about how their students’ time is spent and engage with them through comments.

EdPuzzle’s “make any video your lesson” allows educators to personalize videos, and then provides them with real-time data insights about formative assessment items embedded in videos. Teachers can share their videos via Microsoft Teams and can use the video on group calls. They can also access the embedded screen recorder, which enables them to record videos and then immediately edit them.

Impero’s suite monitors every device to safeguard students, prevent harmful and malicious content, and keep them productive online. Impero Classroom is fully embedded in Microsoft Teams, allowing teachers to monitor student activity and provide resources and support in real-time while also taking advantage of all Teams features in a single interface.

Kami is an interactive learning platform that empowers educators to teach, provide feedback, and assess students in a real-time collaborative experience. With Kami, teachers and students work in tandem using a wide range of annotation and multimedia tools compatible with any web browser. And because of its Teams integration and OneDrive Single Sign-on (SSO), Kami expands the teacher toolkit with ease.

Mindsets accelerates collaboration and student success in math with Microsoft SSO to help students get started quickly. Microsoft Immersive Reader initiates collaboration across many languages so that it can help all students be successful.

Nurture helps teachers create personalized feedback informed by pedagogical frameworks without requiring them to dig into the research themselves. It guides them through high quality, formative feedback, and assessment. For students, better feedback leads to more engagement and improved learning outcomes.

Territorium is developed to help students prepare for the careers they want. It helps administrators identify and track student competencies, skills, proof of learning, and outcomes, as well as jobs and career pathways that match these skills profiles.

ThingLink helps create personalized learning experiences that are proven to improve student outcomes. Teachers can track engagement on all learning materials, videos, virtual tours, and educational research. ThingLink scenes can also be embedded in Microsoft PowerPoint O365 with ThingLink for PowerPoint Add-In.

Pillar Two: Foster Well-being

Well-being, including emotional well-being, directly affects students’ motivation, engagement, and learning. The following partners focus on the mental health of students and deliver easily implementable solutions. 

Attender is a groundbreaking way for teachers to mark attendance. It uses gamification to motivate students to attend class. With a recently released Teams integration, Attender can automatically mark students’ attendance while they’re learning online. 

eCare Vault’s Safe Spaces application allows educators and school staff to support student mental health through a privacy-compliant collaboration workspace directly from Microsoft Teams. At its core, eCare Vault provides personalized pathways that increase mental well-being, engaged learning and productivity.  

Districts and schools across the world are rapidly adopting Microsoft Teams to facilitate remote and hybrid learning. Lightspeed Systems is here to help ensure that learning within the platform is safe and effective. Lightspeed Alert™ and Lightspeed Classroom Management™ fully integrate with Microsoft Teams to empower district leaders and educators with the visibility, actionable insights, and tools needed to ensure student safety and engagement while learning, whether hybrid or remote.

Natterhub teaches K-6 students the soft skills that underpin positive digital citizenship. The app prepares students to thrive online by using a gated space where soft skills can be applied, tracked, and assessed. Natterhub is aligned to the curriculum with more than 350 interactive lessons and activities.

Pear Deck is designed to support proven strategies in daily classroom instruction, making it easy for teachers to follow best practices that reduce achievement gaps and improve outcomes for all students. The Pear Deck ecosystem works with Office 365 logins, PowerPoint Online, and integrates with Teams.  

Senso.Cloud is an all-in-one software for network, classroom, safeguarding, monitoring, and asset management. It supports Microsoft Teams chats and uses extensive keyword libraries to support well-being and safety related to issues such as bullying, self-harm, weapons and violence, drugs, extremism, and more. Senso’s software also has built-in AI that supports image analysis to identify threats and changes by using simple and quick e-discovery.

School Day improves students’ well-being and social-emotional learning (SEL) by asking them questions about their well-being, then analyzing the data and providing real-time insights. It highlights what’s going well in the classroom and provides easily implementable solutions. Whether in a single classroom or at the school and district levels, School Day helps students and educators around the world understand how well-being improves learning outcomes. When students feel good, they learn better.

Soundtrap enables students and teachers to capture their creativity, use their voice, and choose their pathways for creative projects. It not only supports student engagement, but also enhances the social-emotional learning experience by empowering students to make authentic choices about how they demonstrate their knowledge. Soundtrap works in collaboration with Microsoft Reflect to highlight how music and podcasting can be positive and proactive coping tools for SEL challenges.

Pillar Three: Inclusively Designed

Every student deserves the resources and support they need to reach their full potential. Tools that are inclusively designed are key to this pillar, and the following partners are exemplary in their support.

Antares amplifies the teaching and learning experience on Teams by engaging students and teachers in discussions beyond the classroom material and encouraging knowledge sharing through questions and answers. Teachers can proactively schedule content throughout the term to engage students in discussions. 

BookWidgets is a content creation and evaluation tool for teachers. With BookWidgets, teachers can create more than 40 interactive exercises and auto-graded assignments with over 35 different question types. All teachers from all courses can easily use BookWidgets by using the Microsoft Teams integration. This integration enables teachers to follow student progress in real time when they are working on a BookWidgets assignment so that they can quickly guide their students in the right direction when they need help. 

The PebbleGo Create (with Buncee) platform lets students of all abilities access thousands of informational articles, ready-made activities, and literacy supports. With Buncee’s creator tool, students are empowered to choose how they would like to document and demonstrate their knowledge acquisition. Access to video, audio, graphics, text, drawing, and photos within the safe and easy-to-use platform offers students the option to create using whatever medium they’re most comfortable with.

Flat for Education is an intuitive and engaging tool for music teachers and students. Users can create scores, write, collaborate on projects, and much more. Educators can organize classes, grade assignments, and provide instant feedback. Flat helps music educators save time and focus on what matters most: teaching.

Haldor believes all students should have the same possibilities to learn–and that’s why Microsoft’s Immersive Reader is seamlessly integrated into all of Haldor’s solutions. The learning tool can be used by students in their plans, assignments, news, messages to and from the teacher, and more. It is also available for parents and caregivers to help with homework, view assignments, and learn about school news. Haldor and immersive reader enable students to read—regardless of their ability and language knowledge.

InPlace Network transforms the laborious, intensive, and time-consuming manual processes of managing student placement into a streamlined workflow. The InPlace solutions offer extensive student-friendly features including placement applications, roster maintenance, communication with supervisors and placement coordinators, timesheets, surveys, payments, and much more. InPlace Network ensures that students feel extremely supported throughout their placement experience.

ITWorkx Education learning platform allows access to learning resources and material from different publishers and sources through one gateway and with a seamless experience. All student activities are tracked and recorded in the Learning Record Store, allowing insights and intelligence to enhance student learning experiences. Teachers and faculty can develop their skills through the platform’s deep integration with Microsoft Learn.

NEO by Cypher Learning is an intelligent learning platform (ILP) used by schools and universities worldwide. It’s known for delivering a great user experience by making learning engaging and inclusive while incorporating all the essential tools that institutions need to support efficient teaching and learning. NEO helps schools manage all classroom activities, such as building and delivering educational materials, assessing students, tracking their progress, automating learning processes, and promoting communication and collaboration between students and faculty.

Revisely aims to make qualitative education accessible to as many students as possible in the world. Teachers save time correcting and can give more insightful feedback through the tool, helping students become more efficient learners. And Revisely provides school management with clear insight into the reporting and benchmarking tools.  

Snapplify helps educators, students, and parents use technology, work smarter, and achieve educational success. Snapplify Engage is an e-learning platform that has everything in one place, providing schools with user and content management tools, digital library functionality, resource sharing, teacher empowerment tools, assessment tools, and reporting and analytics tools.At the core of Toucan’s product ecosystem is one simple idea: empathy. Toucan has more than 600,000 monthly active learners from all over the world, most of whom are students seeking to learn a new language. And because what works for one student or teacher may not work for another, Toucan focuses on building inclusive features and expanding to platforms such as Microsoft Edge. Toucan aims for as many students as possible to have access to a high-quality, easy-to-use, low-cost learning tool.

Whiteboard.chat is an online interactive digital notebook that brings together educators and learners from around the globe. Students can join Whiteboard.chat classes directly from Microsoft Teams and OneNote. Each student gets their own whiteboard notebook where teachers’ instructions and teaching materials are replicated. However, students cannot see each other’s work. And because teachers have a bird’s eye view of all students’ notebooks in real-time, students can always signal if they need help, and then receive personalized attention.

Pillar Four: Secure & Future-proof IT

Solutions that are secure, future-proof, and trustworthy are essential to unlocking digital transformation. 

classroom.cloud is a cloud-based app. It provides teaching tools, classroom management, online safety resources, and an IT management solution. The app helps schools implement blended learning with both in-school and remote students. Supporting multiple platforms (including Windows 11 and 11 SE–perfect for a Microsoft 365 cloud environment) and a full mix of devices, it helps to future-proof your school. It starts with Microsoft Student Data Sync and SSO to quickly create classes and manage student data with ease. Teachers have a clear view of all their students’ screens and can monitor, collaborate, assess, and control activity. From locking students’ screens to controlling and launching websites or apps, teachers can shepherd and nurture teaching and learning, while maximizing lesson time. 

Create more effective, engaging, and safer learning with GoGuardian Admin and GoGuardian Teacher in Windows environments. Whether students are working in a classroom or from afar, GoGuardian for Windows devices helps school leaders create educational environments where every student can thrive. GoGuardian is a Student Privacy Pledge signatory and provides schools control of their students’ data consistent with Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (“COPPA”), and all other applicable state laws.

Find Microsoft Education Partners to help transform your classrooms. And if you’re at ISTE 2022, come see us!

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2020 has had its ups and downs for sure, but in spite of all the challenges facing educators and students, incredible things have been happening around the world. As we round the corner into 2021, we want to enter a new year with a spirit of hope and celebration by looking back over some of this year’s most exciting moments. Follow along with us as we share the Minecraft: Education Edition highlights of 2020!

The Move to Remote Learning

No review of the past year can ignore the massive impact of the global pandemic. Lockdowns and social distancing restrictions made the conventional classroom experience impossible. Educators worldwide had to find creative ways to keep learning going, even when students were staying home. In response to lockdown measures, we announced that Minecraft: Education Edition would be available through the end of the 2019–2020 school year to anyone with an Office 365 Education account.

Many educators discovered that Minecraft was an ideal tool for creating a virtual and hybrid classroom experience, giving students the chance to connect and collaborate as they learned from home. You can read stories about the innovative ideas for remote learning solutions that dedicated teachers dreamed up, including virtual re-creations of schools in New York State, architectural exploration in Wales, and citywide collaboration in Canada.

We knew that graduating students would be upset about missing the opportunity to celebrate their achievements. Many university students decided to take matters into their own hands by re-creating their campuses to host virtual ceremonies in Minecraft. Inspired by campus builds like Berkeley University’s Blockeley U, our team decided to create the Graduation World as a space for educators and students to celebrate the end of a tough school year together.

Remote and hybrid learning continue in many places, and we hope you’ll take advantage of our resources and training to help support your students in or out of the classroom.

Big Moments for Minecraft: Education Edition

2020 wasn’t all about lockdowns and remote learning. There were some massive announcements from our team as well! The biggest came in August when we revealed that Minecraft: Education Edition would be available on Chromebooks for the first time. This announcement meant that millions of students would be able to access Minecraft for learning. We’ve even made it possible for learners to use their Google for Education credentials for easier access through single-sign-on. And we couldn’t resist a bit of fun with our Back-to-School Update, so we brought bees into Minecraft: Education Edition to help teach students about pollinators!

For another first, October marked the launch of the inaugural Minecraft Education Global Build Championship. This international competition invited students to reimagine a world where humans and animals can coexist safely and happily in a school, home, workplace, or public space situated in one of five habitats. We received over 1,250 entries from students sharing their exciting ideas for an ecologically sustainable future. In the end, a team from Canada took the top prize with a truly epic turtle research habitat. You can see their entry and the rest of the winners here!

One handy update made it easier than ever for teachers to get lessons and learning content to their students. Educators now have the ability to share worlds and lessons to Microsoft Teams from within Minecraft: Education Edition!

We also wanted to ensure teachers felt supported with the right resources to keep them on the cutting edge of game-based learning and pedagogy, so we assembled two new training resources. The newly updated Teacher Academy takes educators through an 11-course learning path designed to build a foundation for using Minecraft in the classroom. The brand-new Coding Academy takes the learning a step further, outlining the ways you can use Minecraft: Education Edition to teach computer science. Our brand-new Community Hub contains mountains of helpful support materials and a place where educators can connect with colleagues to share ideas, get help from peers, or just chat about all things Minecraft.

A Whole World of New Teaching Content

2020 was one of our biggest years ever for new lessons and learning material. We tried to make sure there was something for everyone, across almost any subject you can name. Here are some of our most exciting highlights:

• Hour of Code: A Minecraft Tale of Two Villages explored empathy and inclusion through the power of code as students attempted to smooth over the grudge between Villagers and Illagers.
• The Build with Bees lessons helped students understand the secret—and fascinating—lives of these apex pollinators, from their anatomy and life cycle to how they collect nectar and produce honey.
• Conversations around race, equity, and inclusion came to the forefront in 2020, so we worked with educators and Teaching Tolerance to create Good Trouble: Lessons in Social Justice. The first lesson came out in October, and there are more on the way in 2021!
• In a year like this, student well-being is an essential focus for educators. Social-emotional learning content laid a foundation for building mindfulness, self-expression, digital citizenship, and more.
• It was a big year for computer science learning. We wanted to provide students with a path from the beginning of their coding journey to more advanced programming challenges. Our updated Computer Science Subject Kit now includes more than 150 hours of coding content arranged in a helpful progression from beginner to advanced lessons. Coding FUNdamentals progresses through three imaginative adventures as students learn to code. Artificial Intelligence lessons help learners engage with this exciting realm of computer science. Finally, two sets of Python lessons offer activities in a more advanced programming language. You’ll find all of these lessons and more in one epic resource: the Computer Science Subject Kit.
• Earth Day offered a chance to explore sustainable energy and urban design with the Lumen City and Power Challenges across two massive worlds, one set in a sprawling city and another amidst a series of power facilities.
• With Esports igniting students’ imaginations, we released a fantastical set of worlds where students could take part in competitive and collaborative build battles.
• The English Language Arts Pack included ten lessons designed to help students work on their reading and writing skills, from setting to character to narrative structure.
• If history fascinated your students, they could experience an in-depth look at the background, conditions, tactics, and technology of World War I in a new lesson pack.
• Learners had the chance to strap in and blast off to the International Space Station where they could explore space science in ten lessons, including physics, engineering, botany, psychology, and more.

There’s something for everyone in our 2020 content, and we know these lessons will continue to inspire students in the years to come!

Striking Stories from the Global Educator Community

It’s always educators who inspire us most, especially in such a challenging year. We heard from passionate leaders across the globe about the ways they use Minecraft: Education Edition to empower and delight their learners.

• In Atlanta, the Minecraft Student Ambassador Program gave students the chance to lead learning for their peers and teachers alike!
• More than 1,000 students from 31 schools participated in the first national NAIDOC Minecraft Education Challenge in Australia, blending Indigenous knowledge with modern technology to envision a different world.
• At Villanova University in Pennsylvania, a Classical Studies professor explored Roman ruins and scenes from the Iliad with Minecraft.
• The Queensland University of Technology’s Digital Media Research Centre partnered with our team to conduct research into how Minecraft supports math learning in Australian classrooms. The results were fascinating—and very encouraging!
• For Safer Internet Day, the Microsoft team in Croatia hosted a competition in a Minecraft world to teach students about online etiquette, safety, and digital citizenship.
• Girls Who Game empowered female students to pursue STEM through a country-wide build challenge in Canada.
• Wales launched a series of educator-led Minecraft Learning Centers to help teachers across the country build their game-based learning skills.
• Regional build challenges were all the rage, with national competitions in Germany, Norway, Turkey, and many more.
• When faced with the challenges of the worldwide pandemic, educators in Victoria, Australia, developed creative solutions for teaching in remote and hybrid learning environments using Minecraft.
• The Minecraft: Education Edition China Summer Camp invited students in China to take part in a summer of learning, with free lessons, online workshops, and a build challenge that produced some fantastic creations.

When you’re working with educators, you don’t have to look far to see the passion and inspiration that drives their work day-in and day-out. Nothing makes us more grateful to support their work than hearing amazing stories like these!

Now that we’re finally leaving 2020 behind, we want to thank every teacher who’s gone the extra mile for their students and innovated new ways to use Minecraft: Education Edition. We know you’ll continue to do great things in the coming months and years. Here’s to a great 2021!

If these stories have inspired you to begin your Minecraft: Education Edition journey, head to education.minecraft.net/get-started to take your first steps.

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ISTE20 Live is fully virtual this year, and we’ll be right there to help educators explore ways to use Minecraft: Education Edition to support student learning across the curriculum—whether you’re teaching online or in person. We’ll be joining the Microsoft Education team to beam onto your screen with tips, tricks, and advice for game-based learning.

All of our sessions are 15 minutes long, and they’ll be taking place in the Microsoft Content Room, so all you need to do is tune into the stream when there’s a session that interests you. You’ll find sessions on topics from remote learning and inclusive teaching to computer science and digital citizenship. We’ll have moderators from our team in each of the sessions to make sure we’re answering any questions you might have. We’re excited to connect!

To make things easy for you, here’s an at-a-glance schedule of the sessions featuring Minecraft: Education Edition.

Sunday, November 29

10:45 AM PT: Nathan Richards, Remote learning with Minecraft: Education Edition
With learning models changing in ways we’ve never seen before, teachers are adapting to how students learn, connect, and collaborate with one another. Discover ways that Minecraft: Education Edition can help students explore, build, and learn together online when they can’t share the same physical classroom.

Thursday, December 3

11:30 AM PT: Felisa Ford, Good Trouble – Teaching Social Justice in Minecraft: Education Edition
Take a trip through time and across the globe with civil rights activist and Congressman John Lewis to learn about people who changed the world by leading social justice movements. Students embark on a journey that includes Black Lives Matter, the US Civil Rights movement, Gandhi’s struggle for Indian independence, and more. This session unpacks the ways that the Good Trouble lesson can help students understand the impact of these movements and their leaders, and explores how learners can contribute to building a better world.

11:45 AM PT: Becky Keene, Experiencing History and Deep-thinking Skills with Minecraft: Education Edition
See how students engage in learning about history, coding, engineering, and more through the immersive experience of the World War I Toybox in Minecraft: Education Edition.

12:00 PM PT: Suzannah Calvery, Mindful Mining – Infusing Social-emotional Learning with Minecraft
We all need to build our social-emotional intelligence, and the tools available through Minecraft: Education Edition provide opportunities to build mindfulness, communication, and collaboration skills. See how the Mindful Knight lesson teaches mindfulness, empathy, self-regulation, and resilience, then discover more lessons that foster creativity and collaboration.

12:15 PM PT: Bob Irving, Promoting Digital Citizenship – Immersive Roleplay in Minecraft: Education Edition
Learn about how Minecraft: Education Edition’s new Digital Citizenship world provides an immersive tool for teaching students about digital theft, media literacy, sharing, and harassment, preparing them to collaborate successfully with peers online.

12:30 PM PT: Sarah Red-Laird, Build with Bees! STEM Lessons in Minecraft: Education Edition
Turn students’ fear of bees into feelings of fascination and fun with the founder and director of the Bee Girl nonprofit. Explore 11 NGSS-aligned STEM lessons designed to help students understand the importance of bees in our ecosystem, their biology, and how we can contribute to bee health!

1:30 PM PT: Felisa Ford, Good Trouble – Teaching Social Justice in Minecraft: Education Edition
Take a trip through time and across the globe with civil rights activist and Congressman John Lewis to learn about people who changed the world by leading social justice movements. Students embark on a journey that includes Black Lives Matter, the US Civil Rights movement, Gandhi’s struggle for Indian independence, and more. This session unpacks the ways that the Good Trouble lesson can help students understand the impact of these movements and their leaders, and explores how learners can contribute to building a better world.

2:15 PM PT: James Protheroe, Minecraft Hour of Code for Elementary Students: Block-based Coding
The world of computer science can be an intimidating place for those of us who come from non-STEM backgrounds, but bringing code and computational thinking into your classroom doesn’t have to be overwhelming. Join this session to learn more about fostering your own understanding while also introducing computer science principles at a beginner level through this year’s Minecraft Hour of Code block-based coding tutorial.

2:30 PM PT: Andrew Balzer, Minecraft Hour of Code for Intermediate Coders: Text-based Python Coding
The world of computer science can be an intimidating place for those of us who come from non-STEM backgrounds, but bringing code and computational thinking into your classroom doesn’t have to be overwhelming. Join this session to learn more about fostering your own understanding while also introducing computer science principles at an intermediate level through this year’s Minecraft Hour of Code Python activities.

2:45 PM PT: Peter Doherty, Coding in Minecraft: Fun Computer Science for Middle School
Coding in Minecraft is a remote-ready computer science credential and CSTA-aligned curriculum program delivered through Minecraft: Education Edition. This curriculum immerses students in a Minecraft world to develop and demonstrate their coding skills using MakeCode and JavaScript or Python. In this session, you’ll hear from educators who are seeing success with this content.

Friday, December 4

12:15 PM PT: Steve Isaacs, Learning Through Creative Competition with eSports in Minecraft: Education Edition
With the number of eSports spectators now eclipsing that of the NFL in the US, how can educators harness students’ passion for competitive gaming to drive learning outcomes in classrooms and after-school clubs? In this session, learn about ways that Minecraft: Education Edition is entering this exciting new arena.

Saturday, December 5

10:45 AM PT: Nathan Richards, Remote Learning with Minecraft: Education Edition
With learning models changing in ways we’ve never seen before, teachers are adapting to how students learn, connect, and collaborate with one another. Discover ways that Minecraft: Education Edition can help students explore, build, and learn together online when they can’t share the same physical classroom.

You can find all of these sessions and more in the Microsoft ISTE20 Live schedule. Come connect with us, bring your questions, and enjoy the virtual conference experience with our team! If you’re curious about Minecraft: Education Edition and want to come to the table with a few questions, explore this powerful tool for game-based learning at education.minecraft.net.

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When faced with the challenges of the worldwide pandemic, educators everywhere have been forced to develop creative solutions for teaching in remote and hybrid learning environments. For teachers in Victoria, Australia, Minecraft: Education Edition represented a powerful vehicle for collaboration and community in the midst of a global health crisis. Read this guest post by education specialist Dr. Bron Stuckey and Lauren Arkley of Victoria’s Department of Education and Training to hear their story.

This is the story of the 2020 Minecraft Innovation Project developed by the Department of Education and Training in Victoria, Australia, in partnership with Microsoft. The heroes of this story are the classroom teachers who took on the challenge of innovating amidst the constraints of prolonged lockdown and isolation in the COVID-19 pandemic through remote and hybrid learning with Minecraft: Education Edition. The extended version of this story—with detailed information and teaching examples—can be found in the Department of Education Sway created to celebrate teacher excellence.

The background of the project

The goals for this project were to create a community of practice that built teacher capacity in using Minecraft: Education Edition by supplying an online collaboration space in Microsoft Teams, a space where teachers would share ideas, lesson plans and resources, and seed increased Minecraft usage across the state. Schools were invited to join the project, to nominate at least two teachers to engage in the work of the community, and to create lesson plan exemplars as part of project deliverables. The project kicked off with a full-day face-to-face gathering in which we acquainted ourselves with each other, Minecraft: Education Edition, and the clusters we chose to gather around.

Moving to remote and hybrid learning

In April, shortly after the Minecraft Innovation Clusters were established, Victorian schools moved to a state of remote and flexible learning in response to the COVID-19 world pandemic. As the state moved into lockdown, teachers began to envision what this new “school” day might look like. They quickly realized that rigidly mapping the in-school day onto remote learning was problematic. For many educators in Victoria, the newness that came with teaching online seemed overwhelming. For teachers in the community, the place Minecraft held in their teaching was under review. This is a community of people eager to innovate and improve teaching and learning, but they soon discovered that while their original curriculum goals for Minecraft might be tempered during remote learning, there was a valuable place for new social experiences and ways of engaging. The community focus became about supporting, sharing, and celebrating rich and diverse social and pedagogical practices.

What follows are some snapshots of teacher and student creativity, problem-solving, and quality learning that took place over remote and hybrid learning.

A student-created roller-coaster tour of the Botanic Gardens in Melbourne

Supporting Sociability

Teachers were encouraged to tinker with providing new social experiences for their students through Minecraft. This community is comprised primarily of K–6 teachers across 25 geographically dispersed schools. Making up for lost social activity and contact became important for student wellbeing and student-teacher relationships.

Providing sociability creates room for students to surprise you

Creating sociability is about more than leaving your learners in a world to hang out together. It’s being there to learn with and from them. Julie Powell at Rupanyup Primary School created regular multiplayer sessions where her year 3/4 students could vent their imagination. She gave them an outline of a task and let them “have a crack.” It was vital that she was there with them to see what they could design, execute, and articulate about their building. Julie is also taking the opportunity to hone her own technical skills in these relaxed and informal events.

Create new friendships and collaborations

In Alicia Crang’s multiplayer sessions for students at Cranbourne Carlisle Primary School, she quickly realized that some of her year 6 students were not as experienced as others. Alicia spent dedicated time with those who needed more confidence and experience. Now new collaborations are evident as students are choosing to work with different peers each week.

As you can see by this picture, the joint-world build challenges were also a way for children to express their feelings and come to terms with issues happening in their physical world.

Digital citizenship as a lived curriculum

Darren Giuliano and Tim Murtagh from Newbury Primary School took the whole year 4 class into a multiplayer world and set projects to see who could build their best house. Very quickly, they had a village, and everyone had lots of fun checking in each day to see what was new. It was an excellent opportunity to manage, demonstrate and support expectations, and realize digital citizenship as a lived curriculum. When introducing Minecraft: Education Edition, Danielle Canavan and Chloe Bourke of South Syndal Primary School took the opportunity to develop and establish Minecraft class protocols in conversation with their students.

Sociability comes in many forms

Ivanhoe Primary School’s Lenny Boyd discovered this through his literacy skills lessons with character role-playing in the Storytime Settings lesson. Year 2 Students gathered online as Lenny screen-shared a playthrough of three well-known fairy tales. The students took on the roles of various characters by reading their text bubbles with expression and drama! While students could have played through these stories independently, the live sessions demonstrated that it’s not just in multiplayer worlds where you create connections and relationships for your students.

Ardan Johnston at Aspendale Primary School created connections with his year 4 students through his pop-culture-style videos showcasing student solutions to weekly Minecraft challenges. He shares back pictures or videos of individual student work in a fun and quirky acknowledgement of their efforts. Ardan now reports that some of the most active students in these challenges have been the most disengaged in the past. Having created the model, he is about to pass the baton for hosting the program on to the students.

Watch an example of Arden’s fun video creations

Pedagogical practices

Project-based and challenge-based learning activities came to the fore with Minecraft in remote and hybrid learning. Teachers began to incorporate the game as a choice for projects and creative designs and solutions. Minecraft was included in live class sessions in various ways, from a teacher screen-share for whole-class play in a Minecraft world to a student sharing a walkthrough of their design solution. Some teachers were confident enough to take a deep dive into full curriculum integration, and others needed to ease into Minecraft implementation. These teacher stories demonstrate that Minecraft is an environment that fosters both student and teacher creativity.

Group work and differentiation

Kirsty Bridge from Wallan Primary School has supported year 6 students in the Hour of Code world for Minecraft: Education Edition in preparation for a major coding focus in term 4. She has been working in real-time with differentiated groups to step through the challenges, advancing individual basic coding skills and discussing the logic of coding. Students are working to hone their skills while in remote learning in readiness for a large joint project when back in face-to-face classrooms.

A world for students to use as a template for exploring cartesian planes.

Bring contexts to life

Anastasia Moukas and Joel Parsons at Ashburton Primary School hosted Minecraft Mondays for their year 4 students. After some preliminary build activities, they introduced the topic of Australian history, allowing students time and choice to utilize Minecraft as a form of creative response. Students were asked to read about the lives of different people in one of the World Wars and develop responses about the challenges that faced them. One student, who built a scale version of the cliffs above the beach at Gallipoli in World War 1, commented that she now understood the enormity of the task ahead of the soldiers when her avatar stood below those cliffs.

Nathan Gourzelas and David Tyndal of Eltham East Primary School studied urban redevelopment using the realistically scaled version of the Melbourne Central Business District in Mini Melbourne. Lockdown did not prevent these students in year 5 from touring their capital city. Indeed, Minecraft gave them an advantage as they used their tour on the ground and from the air to find areas they felt needed improvement. As part of their curriculum work, students submitted proposals justifying demolishing and redevelopment on their chosen sites. Student creations included creating a zoo in the Botanic Gardens with a railway tour and entertainment platforms floating in the Yarra River.

Transformation of perennial topics

Adrian Quirk and Marlee Hillier from Morwell Park Primary School were looking to transform the curriculum unit on bridge-building they teach year 5. Adrian created a Minecraft world featuring instructions and challenges. Students were set contexts and scenarios requiring the construction of bridges with increasing complexity. This activity coincided with science and physics sessions on bridge design and purpose, as well as the study of some famous bridge designs around the globe. This was truly a showcase of teacher and student creativity!

Challenge completed: Build a bridge to your friend’s house

Aspendale Primary School’s Matthew Bird had been working with his year 3 students on a literacy unit based around myths and legends, in particular, Theseus and the Minotaur. Students wrote procedural texts about escaping the mythical labyrinth and used mathematical skills to design mazes. Minecraft was offered as a creative option to build a maze, along with Lego, cardboard, or other construction tools. As a culmination, Matthew was motivated to build his own maze, a shared world where he programmed non-player characters (NPCs) to help students to conquer the labyrinth, just as they did in the myth.

Blue sky thinking

Julie Snowdon at Lyndale Secondary College was keen to use Minecraft to light a spark for disengaged students. While onsite, she has started year 7 and 8 Minecraft clubs, and the girls’ club started working on some build challenges together, including Build a Better Bedroom, Build a Campsite, and Build Rollercoasters. The girls have now taken a giant step, partnering with students from Newland’s Intermediate School in Wellington, New Zealand, to design an international Minecraft esports league specifically designed by girls, for girls. They are using Flipgrid to communicate and share ideas between schools. They have worked in Minecraft to design league trophies and brainstorm league frameworks and challenge ideas. It is early days, but they hope to hold their first competitions by the end of 2020.

Next steps

Despite some initial remote learning challenges, teachers in the Minecraft Innovation Clusters have excelled in using the game remotely with their students. They are leading the way for the broader community by demonstrating best practices to teachers across the state. The community hosted a webinar at the close of term 3 in September 2020, where three community members shared their individual journeys with Minecraft: Education Edition in their various learning contexts. Tayla Mason from Whittlesea Primary School, Shaun McEachern at Lyndhurst Primary School, and Sandringham Primary School’s David Jones are three stellar educators who have embraced Minecraft with both heart and intelligence. Feedback on the session praised these teachers for making innovation seem within the grasp of all educators. You can hear about their journeys in this webinar recording.

This success has encouraged us to expand the community, inviting new schools to express their interest in joining and offering our more experienced teachers leadership roles. While the numbers inside the group may appear small, the impact their work is having on the broader education community is immense. We are certain that the lessons learned in this remote and hybrid learning period will serve to strengthen the quality of offerings for Victorian students in all contexts, making 2021 look very rosy for all concerned!

Our teacher community: Bigger in the inside

Curious to hear more of this story? Get the full picture in the Department of Education Sway about the project. Find more stories about the power of Minecraft: Education Edition for teaching at education.minecraft.net/impact.

The post Victoria Celebrates Remote Learning appeared first on Minecraft: Education Edition.

This post was originally published on this site.

The post Victoria Celebrates Remote Learning appeared first on Microsoft Education Blog.

Today we want to show you how to create learning experiences that inspire creativity, deepen student engagement and develop high-level cognitive skills. And we’ll tell you about free resources you can use to ensure your students are developing the future-ready skills they need to be prepared for success in college and careers.

In this episode we’ll show you how: 

• You can help teachers adopt new technology with free teacher training online in the improved Microsoft Educator Center and from Microsoft Stores
• You can access STEM Lessons from Discovery Education directly from within Teams using the new Discovery Education app for Teams
• You can inspire creativity and professional skills for the Windows Video Editor
• Coming soon: You can teach students how to code using Python with Minecraft: Education Edition and Microsoft MakeCode
• You can use Minecraft to develop social-emotional skills like digital citizenship and mindfulness

Microsoft Educator Center

We’re introducing an updated and improved MEC. The Microsoft Educator Center is a platform designed to address the needs of educators. It’s a digital hub where you can find free content, training and support to help you use technology effectively and drive improved student outcomes.

The MEC is home to innovative courses and resources built by teachers for teachers. You can earn badges, go deep on topics through learning paths, build your transcript and grow your expertise. It’s a resource to help you gain new skills related to bringing technology into the classroom, fostering student-center learning, developing future ready skills, creating inclusive and accessible environments and more. Check out the new MEC experience here.

STEM and CS

We’re excited to announce that Discovery Education– the global leader in standards-aligned digital curriculum resources, engaging content, and professional learning for K-12 classrooms– is releasing a new app for Microsoft Teams, the digital hub for bringing classroom content, conversations, assignments and apps together. If you’re using Discovery Education’s high-quality, digital resources for instruction, we know you’ll be thrilled to see those materials available within Microsoft Teams. This integration will save you time, help keep your classes organized, and provide greater opportunities to collaborate with your students and colleagues.

You’ll be able to access Discovery Education’s rich, standards-aligned STEM, Science, Math, Social Studies content and more from within Teams from your device and, connect to the largest educator community of its kind, the Discovery Educator Network (DEN), and very soon, share content with students as an assignment within Teams. We’ll have more to come on that, so keep an eye on our Microsoft Educator Center for training opportunities. And check out the steps below for how to get started.

MakeCode News 

We’re excited to announce the release of Microsoft MakeCode Arcade for general availability. Microsoft MakeCode Arcade is a new online game development environment for simple, visually appealing 2D sprite-based games. Students use drag-and-drop blocks or JavaScript to design and build games and collaborate with friends. Microsoft MakeCode is an open source, free platform for creating inclusive computer science learning experiences that support a progression from blocks to real-world text-based programming. Educators around the world have been using MakeCode for the micro:bit or MakeCode with Minecraft to introduce computing concepts into their classrooms.

We are thrilled to have this new member of the Microsoft MakeCode family in MakeCode Arcade. It’s a great next step up from MakeCode for micro:bit, a development environment that’s popular with educators and students just starting off with coding. The early feedback from MakeCode Arcade Beta users has been positive. Educators say they’re finding MakeCode Arcade to be a draw for diverse learners, and that students love designing their own characters and bringing special effects and music into their games. For those ready to give MakeCode Arcade a try, you can find the latest updates on free curriculum resources here. And you and your students can get started now with this free tutorial here. No login needed!

And in another exciting MakeCode development, we are thrilled to announce that MakeCode will support the Python programming language alongside support for JavaScript and Blocks. Python is a widely used programming language in education and data science, and we heard from many computer science teachers around the world, that they would like to see MakeCode support for Python.

Minecraft: Education Edition 

Computational thinking is a vital skill to develop in students as we prepare them for the workplace, especially since the vast majority of future jobs will require digital skills. Teachers can introduce computer science to students of all ages with Minecraft: Education Edition, which also now supports the Python programming language for MakeCode alongside JavaScript and block-based coding.

From easy Hour of Code tutorials to Computer Science curriculum based on CSTA standards, Minecraft offers all you need to teach coding across the STEM curriculum. Download a free coding demo lesson here for all Windows, Mac, and iPad users—no login required.

In addition to developing STEM skills, students are building social-emotional competencies with Minecraft: Education Edition. A new set of SEL lessons for Minecraft: Education Edition offers special lessons and immersive Minecraft worlds to help educators teach these skills and create inclusive classrooms. Discover the Mindful Knight—an interactive world that introduces mindfulness and self-regulation—and lessons on digital citizenship and empathy.

Curious what else Minecraft offers? Now you can access more than 200 lessons and 50 build challenges with the new and improved in-game Library. Whether you teach history, math, language arts, technology, or biology, Minecraft is an effective tool for engaging students in immersive project-based learning across the curriculum. Check out this story from educators in Ireland and learn how to get started with Minecraft: Education Edition in your school here.

STEM Lesson Plans

Microsoft Hacking STEM is a collection of free, standards-aligned lesson plans that bring project-based learning to the classroom using inexpensive, everyday materials.

In November 2019, the world celebrated the 20-year anniversary of humans living aboard the International Space Station. To inspire and engage students, Microsoft Education and NASA have partnered and developed eight new lesson plans focused around the complex issues to think about when living in space. The collection of middle and high school materials connects core academic concepts with hands-on experiences. Students are challenged to design in 3D, analyze data, build sensors, and use virtual reality and work with machine learning and AI while engaging in discussions about living in space.

We are also excited to share that Carolina Biological Supply Company is launching three new classroom kits to support projects from the NASA collection. These projects include:

• Designing Astro Socks to protect astronauts’ feet in microgravity: This project has students investigating solutions to reduce the impact of working in microgravity on the astronauts’ feet.
• What is the electromagnetic spectrum: This asks students to measure radiation in our environment and examine the light waves and frequencies within the electromagnetic spectrum. Students use sensors to capture live data and relate their observations about life in space to their own on Earth.
• Using materials science engineering to determine heat resistance: This asks students to explore the properties of different heat shield construction materials to protect crew and cargo returning from the International Space Station from the heat generated during the capsule’s descent.

These kits will be available on the Carolina website soon. We hope you leverage these resources to inspire, educate and engage your students.

Data Streamer

The Excel Data Streamer provides students with a simple way to bring data from the physical world in and out of Excel’s powerful digital canvas. With a sensor connected to a microcontroller that is attached to Excel, you can introduce students to the emerging worlds of data science and the internet of things.

We are continuing to add key STEM Partners that support streaming of real time data in Excel using the Data Streamer Add-in. At Bett, Vernier, Pasco and Sphero are showcasing new applications integrated with Excel. This will enable educators to use their existing professional sensors and probes with Excel and modernize their classrooms with live data to transform how students model modern scientific and engineering practices.

An innovation story 

We love hearing stories about educators who use new tech tools in innovative ways to inform instruction and improve teaching and learning. One such story is that of Assistant Principal Lauren Taylor of Manitou Park Elementary School in Tacoma, Washington. She used Microsoft PowerApps, which allows you to build your own mobile apps using templates, to create an app for her school that helps teachers input and evaluate student reading assessment data. Read more about Lauren’s inspiring story here.

New and immersive tools 

HoloLens 2 is now available and bringing immersive mixed-reality experiences to colleges, universities, and K-12 classrooms. Educators are turning to this new tool to enhance key experiences in areas such as life sciences and career and technical education. Some of the upgrades to the new HoloLens include an increased field of view and an enhanced ability to see intricate details on 3D images.

Some examples of HoloLens in use in educational settings include Case Western University in Cleveland, Ohio, where students use it in anatomy classes. You can learn more about that here. And we’ve seen exciting examples of the HoloLens bringing lessons to life with younger students as well. Ewout Warringa recently offered insights into how he uses it to teach construction and technology coursework to 13- to 17-year-old students in the Netherlands in this inspiring blog post.

And if you want to read up on various ways to bring immersive experiences to education and the potential benefits, please check out this white paper we previously released on the subject.

New 3D Models in Windows and Office 

We are excited to announce we now have more than 600 new 3D education models available in Office 365 Education and Paint3D, a built-in creative app that comes with Windows 10. You read that right—more than 600!

To learn more about how you can insert 3D models directly into Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook on Windows and macOS, please check out this post. It’s relatively easy. You insert 3D models much like you insert other images.

3D models can enhance lessons in biology, chemistry, physics, engineering, the humanities and more. Research has shown that providing 3D visualization for students can lead to greater understanding around shapes and spatial relationships.

Inspiring Creativity and offering new ways for students to share what they know 

Video Editor 

We have updates to Video Editor that we know you and your students will enjoy. Video Editor for Windows 10 is our full-featured set of video creation and editing tools for digital storytelling, and it’s free with every Windows 10 device. Students love to use it to create films with background music, text effects, 3D models and special effects. Now with Video Editor you can:

• Split video clips into two or more segments for easier editing
• Back up projects to share with peers and teachers, create templates, and import projects in progress to create a more efficient workflow
• Add content to your video project directly from Bing image search with Creative Commons licenses as captions
• Speed up and slow down video clips to create slow motion or time lapse content
• Rotate photos and videos between landscape and portrait for easier use in your projects
• Have card thumbnails for a video project that reflect edits a user has done to that specific card

If you haven’t tried Video Editor yet, look for it in your Start Menu or search for “Video.” And check out this guide for more details on how to get started using this creative tool.

Up Next…

Thanks for checking out our latest episode of What’s New in EDU, live from Bett. We hope you got some useful information about teacher training, bringing STEM resources into your classroom and ideas for boosting future-ready skills in your students. Please join us tomorrow live from Bett when we’ll look closely at specific ways to foster inclusion and accessibility in the classroom with the help of new ed tech resources. As always, share your feedback with us on Twitter by tagging @MicrosoftEDU! And be sure to sign up for the Microsoft Educator Newsletter here.

The post Live from Bett: What’s new in EDU– Change within the Microsoft Educator Center and fostering future-ready skills in students appeared first on Microsoft Education Blog.

Check back on June 20th for our What’s New in EDU video focused on ISTE. You can also RSVP to each of the livestreams below:

• Pre-event
• Day 1
• Day 3

Pre-Conference Microsoft Innovative Educator (MIE) Teacher & Trainer Academies

MIE Teacher Academy – Convention Center, Room 203A

• Saturday, June 22 from 8:30 AM–3:30 PM

During this one-day teacher academy, you will have the opportunity to explore tools such as Office Online, OneNote Class Notebook, Microsoft Forms and Sway, with the goal of providing your students with learning experiences beyond the walls of your classroom.

MIE Minecraft Academy – Convention Center, Room 203A

• Sunday, June 23 from 8:30 AM–3:30 PM

During this one-day teacher academy, you’ll be introduced to Minecraft: Education Edition, learn to play the game and create curriculum and classroom resources you can take back to your students and continue your journey.

MIE 2-Day Trainer Academy – Philadelphia Marriott Downtown, Meeting Rooms 302-304

• Saturday, June 22 and Sunday, June 23 from 8:30 AM–3:30 PM

Learn more about Microsoft’s hottest tools and resources to empower your staff and students to achieve more! Take an immersive deep dive into Microsoft Teams in Office 365, including uses for staff, Professional Learning Communities and classes.

Microsoft Keynotes: Spotlight on Solutions Sessions – Convention Center, Room 201BC

Digital Transformation in Education 

• Monday, June 24 from 10:30 AM–11:30 AM
• Speaker: Anthony Salcito, VP WW Education, Microsoft

Digital Transformation is not simply about technology. It requires that we re-imagine the future of education and embrace a way of bringing together people, data, and processes to build deeper relationships and create more valuable experiences for today’s students. Join us to learn how.

The Emotion of Data: A Roadmap to Student-Centered Learning

• Tuesday, June 25 from 1:45 PM–2:45 PM
• Speaker: Barbara Holzapfel, GM WW EDU Marketing

Personalized learning helps students develop future-ready social-emotional and academic skills, but what is the best path to personalized learning at scale? Join us as representatives from Florida’s St. Lucie school district and Microsoft Education leaders share how data analytics provides the model for success. (Presentation and panel discussion.)

Conference Breakout Sessions: Convention Center, Room 203B

• Monday, June 24–Wednesday, June 26

During the conference, Microsoft will deliver several 50-minute, role-specific sessions focused on the biggest trends in EdTech.

Hands-on Learning Lab: Convention Center, Room 203A

• Monday, June 24–Wednesday, June 26

Classroom learning with 50-minute interactive sessions where you will get hands-on experience leveraging technology to work on real-world scenarios (devices will be provided).

Live Learning Theater: Booth 2900

• Monday, June 24–Wednesday, June 26

Visit us in booth 2900 to learn more about student-centered learning tools including 20-minute spotlight sessions featuring productivity and accessibility, hands-on STEM experiences, demos, and more!

Additional Microsoft Sessions

eSports for Education: Everything you wanted to know – Philadelphia Marriott Downtown, Salon L*

• Sunday, June 23 | Sessions at 8:30 AM–10:30 AM, 10:45 AM–12:45 PM and 1:00 PM–3:00 PM

Target Roles: Educators, Leaders

In this session, you will hear from educators who are using eSports as part of their curriculum, as part of a sports program or as part of a school club/competition. There will also be organizations that help drive eSports and you will witness a real-time eSports competition. If you’ve been curious about how eSports works and how it can enhance the educational experience, this session will give you the resources and insights you need to get started.

* Salon L is located on level 5 and can be accessed via the escalators.

MakeCode Day – Convention Center, Room 203B

• Sunday, 6/23 from 9:00 AM–4:00 PM

Open to teachers, parent and students – Microsoft MakeCode is an open source platform for creating engaging computer science learning experiences that support a progression path into real-world programming. Microsoft will be bringing MakeCode to ISTE this year, so you can get hands on and learn how to code in real time with no experience needed! As an educator, you will also see how some schools and educators are creating inclusive, engaging learning experiences with Microsoft MakeCode.

Pre-register for any of our three one-hour sessions:

Microsoft MakeCode for Minecraft

9:00 AM and 1:00 PM

Physical Computing with Micro:bit & Circuit Playground Express

10:00 AM and 2:00 PM

Microsoft MakeCode Arcade

11:00 AM and 3:00 PM

Pre-Day Partner Event – Philadelphia Marriott Downtown, Salon K*

• Sunday, June 23 from 10:30 AM–3:00 PM

Microsoft is focused on driving innovation to improve learning outcomes, transform classroom time and enable affordable, easy to manage technology, and is empowering its partners to do the same. In this session, you’ll hear directly from partners who are leveraging the Microsoft Education Platform to:

• Transform modern classroom through turn-key solutions that streamline delivery of technology and facilitate learning.
• Deliver rich, immersive content for instruction, assignments and assessment.
• Enable students to unleash their creativity and develop STEAM skills.

Come learn about the latest innovations in Microsoft Education and how our partners are leveraging the Microsoft Education Platform to achieve more.

* Salon K is located on level 5 and can be accessed via the escalators.

Power what matters in your classroom

• Monday, June 24-Wednesday, June 26 starting at 9:30 AM and running until the Expo Hall closes

Target Roles: Educators, Leaders

Every half hour, join us in the Building Skills area of our booth (#2900) as we uncover how Microsoft tools help support inclusive classrooms, build 21st century skills and amplify student voice.

Partner Solution Showcase – Philadelphia Marriott Downtown, Salon K*

• Monday, June 24–Tuesday, June 25 from 9:30 AM–3:15 PM

Join Microsoft at our Solution Showcase sessions and hear about some of the most impactful examples of Digital Transformation in Education. These sessions are your opportunity to meet fellow practitioners and hear first-hand global experiences, trends and observations from the Microsoft Worldwide Education leadership team.

* Salon K is located on level 5 and can be accessed via the escalators.

Hack the Classroom  streaming live on our Microsoft Education Facebook Channel from ISTE

• Tuesday, June 25 from 6:15 PM–7:30 PM on the Microsoft Education Facebook Channel
• You can RSVP to the Facebook Live event here!

Join us on Tuesday, starting at 6:15 PM. Learn more at aka.ms/hacktheclassroom.

Microsoft in Education is bringing back its largest free online digital event for educators & school leaders worldwide to Hack the Classroom! Streamed live on Facebook, Hack the Classroom is devoted to the changemakers in education and the passionate innovators in student-centered learning. Join us and learn from the educators who are integrating technology in order to better connect with students, and to support them as they become active and engaged learners. These passionate educators will generously share their techniques and philosophies for creating better student outcomes during the event:

• Jessica Tozzi, I Promise School (Ohio, US) shares how her school is empowering students through a focus social-emotional learning.
• Samantha Skubal, J. Sterling Morton District (Illinois, US) shows how she is providing real-world future-ready experiences through their Technology Internship Program.
• Luis Oliveira. Middletown H.S. (Rhode Island, US) demonstrates how he is supporting autonomous learning for English Language Learners through Immersive Reader and Flipgrid
• Jen Padernal, De La Salle University Night College (Philippines) provides her top tips for engaging students through a virtual classroom in Microsoft Teams.
• Toney Jackson, Nellie K. Parker Elementary School, (New Jersey, US) closes out the event again with another original work of poetry that will leave you inspired!

Improving educational outcomes is a key desire we all share, and we are proud to provide a sneak peak of just some of the partners join us on our booth at ISTE 2019!

Integrating digital resources and innovative teaching practices can be challenging. NCCE embraces every opportunity to support educators and educational institutions across the globe through professional learning opportunities.

Are you looking to cultivate critical thinking, coding and communication skills with your students? With the all-new Kano PC, students can build, customize a PC and put it to the test to learn next generation skills. Safe, secure, powerful and durable, the Kano PC is ideal for tomorrow’s classrooms

Pear Deck provides you with the ability to take a presentation, add interactive questions and send it straight to your students’ devices to enable real-time participation. As students engage with your Pear Deck, you see their responses on your device, helping you deliver powerful learning moments to every student, every day.

Are you looking to support STEM in the classroom? Sphero, the creator of programmable robots and educational tools, will be showcasing their ability to enable students to conduct experiments using sensor data from Sphero robots and grow future-ready skill sets.

Have you met the Code.org computer science discoveries curriculum? See how this now been incorporated into OneNote to deliver a Code.org class notebook with the full CS Discoveries 2018 curriculum baked in, saving you time and ensuring your students receive the curriculum in a powerful, effective manner.

Did you know that 10–20% of students are dyslexic or that 91% of educators believe their school needs a better understanding of and recognition of dyslexic strengths? Made by Dyslexia and Microsoft have partnered to deliver a course that provides essential insights into dyslexia to support you in the classroom.

Have you considered introducing your students to the possibilities of collaborative audio recording through podcasting and music composition? Soundtrap has integrated with Microsoft Teams to provide this opportunity and offer you another option to integrate audio into your classroom.

Stay tuned for more information on some of the other partners who will be joining us. As always, to see more partner solutions, please visit aka.ms/eduapps.

Become a Microsoft Innovative Educator

Receive an HTC participant badge and receive 500 points on our Educator Community. Once you’ve earned 1,000 points, you become a certified Microsoft Innovative Educator!

The post What you’ll see from Microsoft Education and our partners at ISTE 2019 appeared first on Microsoft Education Blog.

But somewhere between the play-filled days of preschoolers and the jam-packed high school years, people begin to label themselves as “good at math” or “bad at math.” How many times have you heard someone laugh at themselves and say, “Oh I’m just terrible at math”? As a teacher, however, you know the secret truth: math is a cultivated skill, not an innate ability. It requires a teaching and learning process just like any other academic focus area. And in today’s world, with technology at your fingertips, you’re leading the way in reimagining the teaching and assessing process: presenting math in relevant and engaging ways to ensure that your students build foundational knowledge, as well as a lifelong love of math.

Microsoft Education is here to support teachers and students in every step of this process. Take a look at how you can leverage current technology to support the growth of developing mathematicians—regardless of age or ability.

Build concrete knowledge

A great mathematician is made through a multitude of rich learning experiences. Early experimentation with concrete materials builds the foundation for understanding abstract concepts later. Luckily, if there is one thing students love, it’s hands-on learning! Our human desire to physically manipulate materials can be an amazing leverage point for teachers.

Microsoft’s Hacking STEM enables you to conduct affordable inquiry and project-based activities to visualize data across science, technology, engineering, and math curriculum. Hacking STEM projects explore a relevant question and provide multiple experiences—both physical and digital—to investigate the topic. One math-focused lesson poses the question “How deep is the ocean?”, prompting students to explore remote terrains by modeling and graphing the ocean floor with an ultrasonic sensor to visualize organisms that live in different ocean layers. Teachers love that this lesson is an engaging exploration that not only facilitates math skill development, but interest in the natural world. And many teachers are surprised that Excel can be such a rich and engaging tool for students!

One of the many valuable aspects of educational technology is the ability to use digital versions of physical tools. Microsoft OneNote leverages the functions of many essential physical tools in a digital notebook space.

• With the Ruler feature, students can quickly measure an image on their notebook page or draw a straight line with ease.
• Inking enables students to work more naturally with a physical tool they’re already familiar with: a pen or even their own finger! With intelligent features in the background like ink to shape, students can quickly explore geometry concepts in a way that’s comfortable to them.
• Ink replay allows you to draw a math problem and solution steps, then replay it! From working as a demo tool for teachers, to helping students build understanding of the solving process from start to finish, ink replay can be indispensable for everyone in the classroom.

Practice, practice, and you guessed it, more practice

Like so many things in life, math takes practice (another not-so-secret secret that teachers well know). Math assistant in OneNote for Windows 10 and OneNote Online is a great practice helper. From basic math to calculus, you and your students can convert handwritten equations to text you can edit with ink to math, or simply type them as text and get them nicely formatted using Text to Math. Then the math solver provides step-by-step instructions to the solution. Breaking down a complex problem into steps allows students to build understanding of the solution process. This immediate feedback can be utilized to reverse-engineer the math problem as well. Students can then apply their understanding to similar questions.

Plus, students can graph the equation, providing a visual reference of their work that can be directly inserted into the notebook page. This can help students make the link between the algebraic and graphical solutions to a problem – building a more holistic understanding of the problem and solution. If you’re conducting assessments in OneNote Class Notebook, you can temporarily turn these functionalities off for the students in your class, providing you the flexibility you need.

Today’s classrooms are incredibly diverse. Students come from many backgrounds and teachers differentiate their instruction for various skill levels and needs. Some students with dyslexia struggle with math simply because they have difficulty reading math problems. Other students experience focus issues, or have dyscalculia, a specific learning disability in math.

The Immersive Reader feature in OneNote for Windows 10, OneNote Online, and Word Online can now help these students navigate math problems. Immersive Reader enables students to hear math problems read aloud so students with dyslexia and dyscalculia can rely on another mode of understanding the problem. Students can hear math solver’s step-by-step solutions read aloud for easier comprehension. They can also use other Immersive Reader features, such as line focus and page theme colors. Line focus helps students concentrate on a few lines of text at a time, while page theme colors allow students to pick a background color that best works for their visual preferences.

Conduct formative assessment

As you are likely well aware, formative assessment is critical to helping inform instruction and personalize learning. While formative assessments are best when done frequently and painlessly, creating and taking them can sometimes be cumbersome.

You can easily create practice problems using Microsoft Forms. After creating a form and choosing a problem type, you can click the ellipses and choose Math, allowing you to easily enter problems using the symbols and numbers in the math keyboard.

To save time, Forms now also automatically provides a suggested correct answer as well as incorrect answers. So, at the end of a long day when the caffeine from your second (ahem…third) cup of coffee runs out, you can simply add the automated answers and be done. And if you prefer open-ended questions, your students can also use the math keyboard to enter their answers.

Want to ask a few similar questions in one quiz to ensure students have depth in their understanding and are consistent in their responses? Forms can save time here by automatically generating similar questions: enter one question and suggested similar questions will pop up, which you can then insert into the quiz.

To simplify the workflow, we integrated Forms with Teams Assignments. Since Teams for Education launched, educators have been using Teams to support their collaborative classrooms from a single experience in Office 365 Education. You can now distribute a Forms quiz or survey to your students through Teams, then leverage Forms reporting functionality, like auto-grading, feedback, and scores, directly in the Assignments gradebook. From here, you can also keep track of scores across many Forms-powered quizzes, right where the rest of their class data lives in Teams.

Reflect and communicate

Students can leverage tools like OneNote, Flipgrid, and Teams to develop their skills in self-reflection, communication, and overall digital citizenship.

OneNote gives students a space in which they can explore and document their thinking processes, using photos, videos, and inking to enhance their learning.

Flipgrid is all about communicating, understanding, and amplifying student voice. With Flipgrid, students can easily record themselves explaining their process or even just thinking out loud. This platform creates a powerful space for students who wouldn’t normally share with their teachers and peers, to do so in a safe and fun digital environment. Check out how math teacher Stacey Roshan uses Flipgrid in her AP Calculus class.

And Teams brings them all together. With OneNote, Forms, and Flipgrid integrated into the Teams hub, you and your students can easily access your favorite tools. A personalized learning environment, Teams covers the bases from 1:1 student-teacher communication, to class collaboration, to robust assignments.

Now that’s what we call a rich environment for learning — and learning to love — math. Get started using Microsoft Education tools today with free Office 365!

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