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Microsoft is building a special version of 'Minecraft' for classrooms

microsoft minecraft
A teacher in Ireland plays "Minecraft" with a student.
Microsoft

Microsoft announced on Tuesday that it’s acquired MinecraftEdu, a version of the game “Minecraft” that’s specially built for teachers and students.

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With this acquisition, Microsoft plans to bring “Minecraft” to more classrooms as early as September, in time for the next school season.

According to its website, MinecraftEdu is built “by teachers for teachers” — it offers many additions to the original game “that make it more useful and appropriate in a school setting,” the company says.

MinecraftEdu also offers a cloud solution that allows students and teachers to connect and play together, and the company also offers a huge library of lessons and activities teachers can use for free.

MinecraftEdu has already been used in 45 countries by over 5,500 teachers and over 10,000 schools. Teachers and students that currently use MinecraftEdu will be able to continue using the software normally. And once Microsoft releases its “Minecraft: Education Edition” later this year, existing MinecraftEdu customers will get one year free.

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So what will "Minecraft: Education Edition" look like? We expect it to look pretty similar to MinecraftEdu, but with more curricula for students, more controls for teachers, and better connectivity thanks to Microsoft's cloud. And considering the love and popularity around “Minecraft,” with its wide range of applications from coding to gaming to education and more, we expect Microsoft will build on the success of MinecraftEdu: it sounds like plenty of students and teachers already love "Minecraft" and by extension MinecraftEdu, so this ought to deepen that relationship.

You can learn more about the announcement here, and more about MinecraftEdu here.

Microsoft Education
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