Michiyo joins EVO Minecraft MOOC participants in a deliberately executed tomb raid

Learning2gether Episode 401

On Feb 8, 2019 the EVO Minecraft MOOC temple busting team of Abu Fletcher, Dakotah Redstone, Jane Chien, Mattie Tsai, Michiyo, and Teacher Vance applied logic and geometry (or at least Dak did) to the puzzle of getting into a desert temple by excavating around the side of it and under it, exposing and rendering harmless the TNT that booby-traps the bottom of every unexplored temple, and helping ourselves to what was in the zombie chests.

Dak got the diamond horse armor since he was most deserving and most instrumental in the excavation and had the greatest appreciation for horses in Minecraft as you can hear in the video, here:

The event was announced on Google+ at this link, good only through March 2019
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+VanceStevens/posts/Hp1FEvSXqbf

Michiyo wanted to make ‘her house’ much nicer, with the help of +Olivetree Lighthouse, so she posted, “I explored the desert area. I have collected cactuses in order to make green things. Then collected some sands to make glasses. If I have some time to continue “my house” building, I may be in the world at around 14:00 UTC on the Feb. 7th or 8th. It would depend on how early I could get back from work. If I were there, I would. If not, next day or time.”

She wasn’t able to make it on Feb 7, but she kept her Feb 8 appointment.  Meanwhile, here’s what we did on Feb 7:

Thu Feb 7 EVO Minecraft MOOC moderators Teacher Vance and Dakotah Redstone follow Abufletcher to newly-discovered temple

Michiyo was not able to make it back from work in time, so Dakotah Redstone and Teacher Vance followed Abufletcher to a temple he found buried in a village just north of the one we had all visited last week on our adventure trek. We looked it over but didn’t crack it. We hoped to find others in our community who would want to explore it with us. We posted to our Google+ Community that they could find it on the map just north up the river from our recent trek destination and inside the big grey wall Dak erected around it while we chatting in Discord. I attached this picture:

So when Michiyo appeared next day, apparently Abufletcher, Michiyo’s teacher in Japan, encouraged her to visit the new temple, which is where I met the group when I arrived, having just emerged from a cab at my apartment which had brought me from the bus station in Penang where I had just left a bus that had left Kuala Lumpur 6 hours earlier. I  joined Michiyo, Abu Fletcher, Dak, Jane, and Mattie in Minecraft just as they were all about to head down the polished stone road that Dak had created leading over to the Temple Under Town that Abu Fletcher had found the previous day, where we would see if we could unlock its secrets in a systematic manner.

The event was on the 2019 EVO Minecraft MOOC Live Events schedule, which is linked from the sidebar at the #evomc19 landing page at http://missions4evomc.pbworks.com/. That link should be working far into the foreseeable future.

The event was organized on the EVOMC Google+ Community, which we’ll hate to loose after March 2019. The event evolved in these two posts, the first from Michiyo,
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+VanceStevens/posts/Hp1FEvSXqbf where I had replied the day before, “+Michiyo Toshima joined us today, but not for house building. We went on a temple tour and excavated around the Temple Under Town.”

Don Carroll then made a longer post here
https://plus.google.com/u/0/105443014753998852123/posts/VGCNd9N5Epn
which I reconstruct here since these links to Google+ will no longer work after March.

Don Carroll (Abufletcher)

A most unusual temple!!!  Come and help us explore (but not pillage) both the temple and the village on top of it!  Dak is busy building a protective wall around the village (immigrants welcome).

OliveTree Lighthouse

Great find 🙂  Sorry I couldn’t join. I was fighting with command blocks and was reading and watching things online trying to get them to work as I wanted.

Vance Stevens

The /warp is templeundervillage. I had to go there to test the /warp, and I found that someone, probably one of the villagers, agitated at the recent interest shown by bothersome explorers from another dimension, placed an iron door over the entrance to the most sacred part of the temple. I guess they make iron doors in the blacksmith shop adjacent to the temple precincts. To open the door, you have to know how to operate the ‘device’.  Once inside, the way is, hmmm not exactly clear, but the direction down is (whatever you do, don’t jump down there!)

In another post I invited participants to come help us “loot” this temple but I withdraw that poorly worded invitation and leave the disposal of this one to my esteemed colleague and co-moderator, Abu Fletcher.

If interested in looting a temple I can invite you to another one, if it hasn’t been looted already (I wouldn’t know for sure until I went there and tried to loot it). Sign up for the expedition in the reply area below.

Don Carroll

I’m more interested in how the temple and several village structures seem to have become intertwined.  I’d like to see if we can untangle the parts before damaging anything with a “smash and grab” approach.  Honestly, after looting a few temples, it all gets to be pretty routine.  Often I don’t even bother.

I’ll be in-game at about 14:00 UTC.

Vance Stevens

+Don Carroll Yes, exactly, by “looting” a temple I mean to approach what lays beneath the blue and red tiles in a calm and systematic manner, avoid setting off the TNT, which we know is down there. By working systematically and on arriving safely in the space below, I suggest that we open the lids on the chests that will also be there and peek inside.

I think this is one of those constructive activities that show Minecraft in its most collaborative mode, and reveal to participants how critical language is in the process (for example when Abu Fletcher told me once, in text, DON’T STEP THERE. Step is probably a useful word in English, as is its appearance in a negative imperative.) But more importantly, the instructions to one another as we work toward a common goal are the point of the exercise.

Hope to see you at 1400 UTC if the bus I’m on reaches Penang in time.

If anyone would like to join us in the exploration of this temple and / or others, please click REPLY below.

Don Carroll

Here’s an aerial view of the temple/village (from the dynamic map).

Actually, Vance I would suggest that we entirely leave the “loot” alone.  It’s really not interesting.  Instead, I’d like to see us work creatively and in unison to “map out” how the temple and village structures are intertwined.  For example, can we find minimally invasive ways to get into the main temple structure WITHOUT damaging ANY of the exteriors of any of the village structures?

In fact, anyone who just wants the loot is welcome to get it through a diagonal tunnel (as I have done before on many temples).

Or maybe I should just go in and grab the loot myself now so we can focus on the archeologically interesting aspects of the site. : )

Vance Stevens

+Don Carroll I liked +Dakotah Redstone’s spiral approach, as evident in the video.

The event took place on the EVO Minecraft MOOC 1.12.2 server with voice in Discord

 

Earlier events

Tue Feb 5 Learning2gether episode 400 – EVO Minecraft MOOC visits East Coast Miners for VSTE Minecraft Monday

https://learning2gether.net/2019/02/05/learning2gether-episode-400-evo-minecraft-mooc-visits-east-coast-miners-for-vste-minecraft-monday/

While EVO Minecraft MOOC is in session through Mid February, earlier events are being archived here:

http://missions4evomc.pbworks.com/w/page/130258521/2019_Live_Events

Learning2gether episode 400 – EVO Minecraft MOOC visits East Coast Miners for VSTE Minecraft Monday

Learning2gether Episode 400

https://youtu.be/DQzH8iaWMW4

On Tuesday, February 5 in Europe and points east of there, but still February 4 in the USA, Kim Harrison a.k.a. K4sons invited EVO (Electronic Village Online) Minecraft MOOC  participants to visit VSTE’s Minecraft Monday, a regular monthly event hosted by the Virginia Society for Technology in Education. Dakotah_Redstone and Beth O’Connell helped plan it with her. The VSTE events are held on the first Monday of each month from 8 to 9 PM EST (New York time).

Today they were visiting East Coast Miners, a building guild for under-16s patterned on the work of Jo Kay’s Jokaydia, http://www.jokaydia.com/. East Coast Miners provided a tour of what that the teachers are doing with kids after hours.

After settling into the environment, we started recording at a turtle farm where one of the kids was raising turtles. The new release of Minecraft 1.13.2 contains an underwater environment that spawns corals and a variety of sea creatures, so after swimming with the turtles, we moved to a coral reef where we swam with dolphins and other creatures, and visited an underwater shipwreck. There DarkKnight tossed some treasure maps into the water and you can see on the video where your map shows your location and allows you to use your F3 coordinates to navigate to X-marks-the-spot, where there was buried treasure. We all went there and eventually uncovered a treasure chest full of goodies.

We then lapsed into a reflection of how this might work for learners of a variety of topics, including learning languages. Jane in Taipei related how her son Mattie was interacting with the East Coast Miners and developing his English and problem solving skills.

Here is Jane’s reflection

Thank you, +Kim Harrison for inviting us on the East Coast Miners server. Treasure hunting was a lot of fun! The coral reef and tropical fish are so beautiful! I think that kids can learn far more by collaborating and communicating with players in Minecraft than they can by taking online synchronous language lessons (Online language tutoring/learning has been a trend lately). I see a lot of creativity, problem-solving, and peer-teaching with patience in Minecraft. I was taught by Cats, a teenage east coast miner, how to fly. She gave me lots of tips and feedback to my repeated failing attempts, and with her help, I re-learned how to fly in survival mode in Minecraft!

===Info on East Coast Miners from the website: http://www.eastcoastminers.org/====
The East Coast Miners Minecraft Community is operated by two educators and one geek (engineer) in the hopes to enrich STEAM skills science, technology, engineering, art and math as well as communication and collaboration skills.

 

How to join the VSTE server?

You need the latest release 1.13.2
connect to server.eastcoastminers.org

VSTE is the Virginia Society for Technology in Education, https://vste.org/about-vste/. VSTE Minecraft Mondays occur the first Monday of every month and lead into the annual VEPLN summer of survival (for last year’s event see https://vste.org/vepln-summer-of-survival/ and https://sites.google.com/view/vstesofs17/. There is also a Google+ Community until early April,
https://plus.google.com/communities/106561495889390694090 )

We’ll all be sad to see this and so many other fruitful communities disappear from Google+, a real blow to educational collaboration when that happens.

 

Earlier events

 

Sun Jan 27 Rose Bard, Dakota Redstone, and Jane Chien host a Building Challenge on the EVO Minecraft 1.12.2 server

https://learning2gether.net/2019/01/27/rose-bard-dakota-redstone-and-jane-chien-host-building-challenge-on-evo-minecraft-1-12-2-server/

 

Fri Feb 1 Teacher Vance and Bobbi Bear lead sandbox adventure trekking on EVO Minecraft 1.12.2 server

Teacher Vance and Bobbi Bear led an adventure trek to some desert temples in the 21k area.

The challenge

Anyone can join us. If you need gear we’ll equip you before we set out.

We meet in the 24k area and trek north to a river. We’ll have to trailblaze to the right river system.

From there we take boats to a village full of husks and villagers who will trade emeralds for rotten flesh and coal.

The temples are near there.

On this first meeting we embarked on the journey to see what would happen. In a little over an hour we had reached the temples.

Here are two YouTube recordings

Vance’s version, sound problems

Dak’s version below, with Discord chatter

If you wanted to join us, here’s how
http://missions4evomc.pbworks.com/w/page/130258521/2019_Live_Events#Howtojoinus

Vance Stevens presents a Convergence of Minecraft and Techno-CLIL

Learning2gether Episode 315


Download mp3:
https://learning2getherdotnet.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/vance-stevens-presents-on-minecraft-and-gamification-for-the-clil-evo-mooc-cfnstwye1zy.mp3?

On Wed Feb 3 Vance Stevens presented on EVO Minecraft MOOC for participants at the Techno-CLIL EVO MOOC. The talk was titled Vance Stevens on Minecraft and FLT and CLILfor the WizIQ announcement, but Vance called it

A Convergence of Minecraft and Techno-CLIL

Recordings:

This presentation is about a correspondence between two EVO (Electronic Village Online) sessions:

  1. the EVO Minecraft MOOC (EVOMC16) and
  2. Techno-CLIL (content and language integrated) approach to language development

This was the abstract

There is much evidence that Minecraft can enhance language development; for example, the cases discussed in in an article by co-moderators of the EVOMC16 session (Smolčec & Smolčec, 2014). This presentation will suggest to educators interested in adopting the CLIL approach how they might consider Minecraft as a representation of content, and see how language development might derive from interaction in a gamified environment based on that content.

The EVOMC16 session provides an opportunity for educators to understand how this might work for them by having them explore gamification through the experience of being in a game that that looks like Minecraft, but is in fact a place where they can meet other educators learning how their students can benefit from gamified environments. These educators learn through following a model whereby they go to a Google+ community and figure out from there what they have to do to play the game. Eventually they end up in Minecraft in creative mode, and then graduate to coping with survival, as they come to see, by cooperating with other players in the more challenging game environment.  The ‘aha’ moment occurs when the players succeed and realize that if what they were trying to teach were placed in such a context, it would not only become more engaging to the learners, but their students would be taking their own learning into their own hands. This can create a powerful learning environment, and educators need to experience it for themselves in order to understand it.

So, we are all learning about gamification here. It’s not so much about Minecraft. Minecraft is the little g game (Gee, 2008), the enabler of our emerging knowledge of gamification. When you enter survival mode you’ll find that you are assisted by others in world. With their help you stay alive and learn. So gamification turns out to be learning through teamwork and mutual support and meeting challenges and achieving your goal, whatever it is. In this game you set your own goals. By achieving your goals in the game light bulbs go off in your head and light your way to some realization of how what you are learning in Minecraft might work to meet your real world challenges.

References

Gee, J.P. (2008) “Learning and games.” The ecology of games: Connecting youth, games, and learning. Edited by Katie Salen. The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Series on Digital Media and Learning. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. (pp. 21-40). Available: http://ase.tufts.edu/DevTech/courses/readings/Gee_Learning_and_Games_2008.pdf

Smolčec, M & Smolčec, F. (2014). Using Minecraft for Learning English. TESL-EJ 18, 2 (1-15). Available http://tesl-ej.org/pdf/ej70/int.pdf. Includes an editorial introduction by Vance Stevens.

The talk followed along the lines of this blog post
http://advanceducation.blogspot.ae/2016/01/week-3-playing-big-g-game-of-evo.html

Google+ event
https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/c6flemojt2c16l4tcufb7j31r04

Announcements

Earlier this week

Sun Jan 31 1400 UTC Thorsten Groß’s students conduct tour of Ricarda-Huch-Schule for EVO Minecraft MOOC

https://learning2gether.net/2016/01/31/thorsten-gross-students-conduct-tour-of-ricarda-huch-schule-for-evo-minecraft-mooc/

 

Sun Jan 31 1500 UTC Vance Stevens presents Learning2gether Episode 314 with blogs and wikis for EVO session ICT4ELT

https://learning2gether.net/2016/01/31/learning2gether-with-blogs-and-wikis-for-evo-session-ict4el/

 

Learning2gether with Mbarek Akaddar about managing EVO with Trello

Learning2gether Episode 274

Download mp3:
https://learning2getherdotnet.files.wordpress.com/2015/05/learning2gether-with-mbarek-akaddar-about-managing-evo-with-trello-qvypknxtqqq.mp3?

On Sunday May 24 at the usual time of 1400 GMT Learning2gether was pleased to meet with Mbarek Akaddar on the topic of managing the Electronic Village Onilne coordination team for the coming year with the Trello project management tool.

What’s it about?

Mbarek Akaddar is well-known in #webheadsinaction and #EVO circles for his edtech skills. He has recently taken on the task of head coordinator of EVO (Electronic Village Online) coordination team where he has introduced Trello as a coordination portal. In this meeting Mbarek will present Trello, which is a management and collaboration tool that organizes projects into boards, lists and cards. We’ll also talk about his plans and vision for EVO in 2016 and beyond. Before his talk he referred us to these links:

EVO Portal: http://evosessions.pbworks.com/

EVO CoP for 2014: http://evosessions.pbworks.com/Call_for_Participation2014

Trello Tutorial, explains cards, the back of the card, etc: https://youtu.be/aaDf1RqeLfo

Where? Google+ Hangout on Air

Show notes

Elizabeth Hanson-Smith shared this Trello blog link

http://blog.trello.com/tips-for-managing-a-remote-team/

Announcements

Copy / paste of chatwing text chat for this session

Learning2gether is about to start now with Mbarek Akaddar, details http://tinyurl.com/learning2gether
4 days ago
If you want to join the hangout I can step out–let me know
3 days ago
Listening to Mbarek Akaddar talk about EVO plans for 2015 and beyond.
3 days ago
great, there are 8 in the HoA now
3 days ago
Hi, I can’t join HOA, am on tablet. A bit slow for me, but am watching live stream! Hi everyone, hi Mbarek
3 days ago
great nice to see you Marijana
3 days ago
Hi Daniel and Marijana!
3 days ago
Hi Nina, Vance, Marjana and all. Happy to be able to join you today.
3 days ago
Haha Nina ,you were the to encourage Mbarek!.
Hi one more time to all, Vance, Daniel, Nina 🙂
3 days ago
Daniel I wonder what you think about this task management tool
3 days ago
ElizHS compares a card on Trello to a forum thread. I think That makes sense.
3 days ago
I can see some applications. How hard will it be to attract other people in a group to Trello?
What I mean is that as early adaptor, I find others may not be as motivated to go where I go.
3 days ago
in this case the manager has implemented trello (or the manager of a company might) and others are simply included
3 days ago
I think you need to have a group and then have everyone use it.
3 days ago
seems that trello is convinient and easy to handle
3 days ago
Fellow is managing tool, organizational tool,we can use it for collaboration,but for our personal use as well. I don’ t know if we can use it for storing images files. How much is the capacity or storage? My question for Vance, thx
3 days ago
I’ll ask
when I have a chance 🙂
3 days ago
Hi Marijana and Daniel 🙂
3 days ago
A card is like a word; a list is a phrase; and a board is a sentence!
3 days ago
Is there a limit to the number of members in a Trello group?
3 days ago
Thx for asking Vance and thx for your answer Mbarek! 🙂
3 days ago
Obrigada JA!
3 days ago
I promise to work more this week on Trello, but am soon busy lately.
3 days ago
Good question Nina, trello is a nice tool, but as any other tool we need to get use to it. My two cents, asTeresa would say 🙂
3 days ago
Vance, could you see this used to plan Learning2Gether events?
3 days ago
no, it would not apply well to L2g, this is for managing people with assigned tasks and roles
3 days ago
Need to go guys, family fun is coming! See you soon, hugs to all! Bye
3 days ago
Bye, Marijana!
3 days ago
ok, thanks Marijana
3 days ago
Exactly, Marijana. Nothing is 100% intuitive
3 days ago
ElizHS: She was asking about the email features
I think Trello is less a communication system than a way to manage projects.
I’d like to see a digest feature.
You have to go into each card when you do it only online.
Jose – I don’t see the little wheel to change the announcements to digest?
I found it —
You can have Never, every hour, or instantly. Not exactly a digest, e.g., every 24 hrs would be better.
3 days ago
ElizHS: There is a voting feature, so that could stand in for short comments like “I like it”
3 days ago
ElizHS: I notice in some of the advertising videos on the Trello site, that their own management team is using Trello with a bunch of other apps for communication. http://blog.trello.com/tips-for-managing-a-remote-team/?utm_source=notification%20link%20&utm_medium=email%20&utm_campaign=manage%20remote%20team
3 days ago
Thanks for hosting. Good information.
3 days ago
Thank you to ALL!!!!!
3 days ago
thanks, we always manage in the end 🙂
the recording should be on YouTube any minute now
3 days ago
(Admin)
This event has been blogged with embedded YouTube recording and mp3 download available, enjoy:https://learning2gether.net/2015/05/24/learning2gether-with-mbarek-akaddar-about-managing-evo-with-trello/
3 days ago

Earlier this week

May 17 1400 GMT LEARNING2GETHER with David Winet on teaching f2f writing using WeChat and Polleverywhere

https://learning2gether.net/2015/05/18/learning2gether-with-david-winet-on-teaching-f2f-writing-using-wechat-and-polleverywhere/

Mon 18 May 1800 GMT Rita Zeinstejer on Fostering Oral Fluency with Free Webtools

Fostering Oral Fluency with Free Webtools

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/8905964/Breeze/Invitation_fluency.pdf

– using English in everyday situations: the best way to practise and improve non native English speakers’ / EFL learners’ oral skills

– free sites which provide English speaking practice will be explored and shared

– three different categories of sites: – language exchange sites, – social communication networks  – educational programs will be examined

– where to find educational programs provided by different educational and cultural institutes

–  effective webtools which help EFL teachers aid their students in their difficult quest for oral fluency will be shared

The following link will take you to the documentation of our webinar
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/8905964/Breeze/NBM_Rita_Zeinstejer_Fostering_Oral_Fluency.pdf

complete with

Find further free webinars for teachers of foreign languages at
http://www.lpm.uni-sb.de/typo3/index.php?id=1258

Thu May 21 1700 GMT Classroom Polling Options with Tilly Harrison

Free webinar with Tilly Harrison: A survey of classroom polling options

  • Find out what your students think: A survey of classroom polling options
  • Rationale for classroom polling
  • Feasibility of classroom polling
  • Types of poll
  • Survey of free options and use
  • Survey and comparison with commercial options
  • The session will include (of course!) plenty of chances to participate in polls
  • Tilly Harrison is a Principal Teaching Fellow (University of Warwick

Thu May 21 1230 EST EdTechMojo hosts Cathy Cavanaugh on eLearning for Engagement

SUNY Delhi in NY is happy to host Cathy Cavanaugh, the Director of Teaching and Learning with Microsoft’s Worldwide Education Unit, for a 1-hour webinar on engaging eLearning practices. This is a free Zoom online webinar, and will interest eLearning faculty, instructional designers, and instructional technologists.

Talk information: 
eLearning for Engagement: Research-based Practices for Student Success
By, Cathy Cavanaugh, PhD.
Director of Teaching and Learning
Worldwide Education, Microsoft

Description:

Keys to engaged teaching have been identified and can be enhanced in online, blended, and mobile learning environments. This session highlights teaching approaches that align to research in engagement and new learning environments, and offers practical suggestions and references for teaching and learning.

Recording

https://youtu.be/JF7ggUQ9uDo

Playlist of other webinars in this series:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQVF4tfpsHGNzflmyjPUS2jOyvdGZ-315

EVO2015 Closing Webcast with Nina Liakos, Vance Stevens, Jeff Lebow, and EVO Moderators and Participants

Learning2gether Episode 261

Where? Bb Collaborate (Elluminate) http://learningtimesevents.org/webheads/ thanks to an ongoing grant from http://www.learningtimes.com/

and thanks to Jeff Lebow, simulcast on http://webheadsinaction.org/live

Recording:

What?  Electronic Village Online has just completed its 15th year of free weeks-long (currently 5 weeks long) sessions of quality professional development sponsored by TESOL, http://evosessions.pbworks.com. This is an event where all EVO2015 participants are invited to gather at the end of this year’s #evosessions to reflect on their EVO experience.

2015-02-16_0603marijana

2015-03-06_1554gr8fun

Links:

2015-02-16_0602nina

Announcements

2015-02-20_1124tweets15feb

With the termination of this broadcast, the Jan 12 – Feb 15
14th annual Electronic Village Online sessions have now ended

Find archives or join the next one at http://evosessions.pbworks.com

Earlier this week

Sun Feb 8 1300 to 1500 GMT – LEARNING2GETHER DOUBLEHEADER Presentations at CO15 and EVO Week 4 events

Sun Feb 8 1300 GMT EVO Minecraft MOOC at the free live Connecting Online CO15 Conference

https://learning2gether.net/2015/02/08/evo-minecraft-mooc-at-the-free-live-connecting-online-co15-conference/

Sun Feb 8 1400 GMT LEARNING2GETHER with Vance Stevens and ICT4ELT Once a Webhead always a Webhead

https://learning2gether.net/2015/02/08/once-upon-a-webhead-learning2gether-with-vance-stevens-and-the-evo-session-ict4elt-about-webheads-in-action/

Mon Feb 9 1700 GMT YLT SIG Webinar: Learn it through an action song

IATEFL YLTSIG has rescheduled the class on ‘YLT SIG Webinar: Learn it through an action song!’ to Feb_09 2015, 09:00 PM ((GMT+04:00) Abu Dhabi, Muscat). You may use the same class link to enter the classroom at its changed date and time.

Message From The Presenter:
We moved the class to Monday instead of Tuesday at the same time 5PM GMT (12PM EST). We hope this will not inconvenience you. Thank you.
Enter the Class

Tue Feb 9 2100 GMT – Action Research Projects Opening Session

Feb_10 2015, 01:00 AM ((GMT+04:00) Abu Dhabi, Muscat).

Enter the Class

Tue Feb 10 EVO15 EFL and Young Learners: Week 5 Showcasing and Reflecting

Class Date: Wednesday, February 11, 2015
Class Time: 12:00 AM ((GMT+04:00) Abu Dhabi, Muscat)
Class Duration: 60 minutes
View complete information

Wed Feb 11 1500-1700 GMT Jeff Kuhn leads Setting up your own Minecraft Server at EVOMC15

This is an EVO Minecraft event about setting up a server using a Skype call; it will be practical practice and not recorded

https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/c5qv1bj2gg9jicp7bl30o51eo68?authkey=CLHZ36iDr7imvAE

Use this space to leave messages related to this event

We’ll monitor http://chatwing.com/vancestev and also Skype

If wishing to join at VANCESTEV to your Skype contacts

An excellent resource is  Joel Mills’s YouTube channel on servers, from the Canvas MC MOOC. The first one is pretty informative about basic server terminology and implications of types of servers, server side mods, and so on – find more on this channel: http://youtu.be/T-jTfkF3i7g

Fri Feb 13 0900 GMT Joel Mills in conference for participants of Canvas Minecraft MOOC

Joel Mills is holding open tutorials on Friday 13th February at 9.00 – 10.00 am GMT for anyone who wants to get some advice or support on any of their Minecraft projects. He will be using the Canvas conference tool again, but in a way that allows people to join in and ask their questions or get support.

Look out for the conference email on Friday morning and follow the link to join in.

For our participants from further afield we will hold a conference onMonday 23rd February at 5pm GMT so we can make sure they can join in live as well.

Fri Feb 13 2015 14:00 GMT NNEST-EVO2015 Webinar with Geeta Aneja

NNEST-EVO2015
Week 5: Feb. 9-15
Invited Speaker: Geeta Aneja
Moderator: Kyung-Hee Bae
nnestevo2015.pbworks.com/

  • Possible practices for approaching research NNEST issues, particularly in the classroom
  • Practical ways to raise awareness about NNESTs/NNESTs issues and implement sustainable best practices
  • Reflection and wrap-up

Where? http://learningtimesevents.org/webheads/

Sat Feb 14 evening GMT Classroom 2.0 Webinar on Lucid Press

Date: Sat.,February 14, 2015
Time: 9:00am PT/10:00am MT/11:00am CT/12:00pm ET
Location: http://tinyurl.com/cr20live (http://tinyurl.com/cr20live)Peggy George, Lorie Moffat and Tammy Moore will be hosting another Classroom 2.0 LIVE show. As an extension to the Classroom 2.0 Ning community, Classroom 2.0 “LIVE” shows are opportunities to gather with other educators in real-time events, complete with audio, chat, desktop sharing and closed captioning. A Google calendar of upcoming shows is available athttp://live.classroom20.com/calendar.html.Following a great webinar on LucidChart with Brad Hanks on Classroom 2.0 LIVE on March 29, 2014. we had many people requesting a follow-up webinar to learn more about LucidPress. We are excited to be able to share this excellent online tool onFebruary 14th with our special guest presenter, Andreas Johansson. Andreas is currently the Director of Technology Integration & Curriculum in Kenston Local Schools, OH and an authorized Google Trainer. His interest lies in creating dynamic events that shape the way we teach, helping teachers effectively and practically integrate technology into their environment, ultimately impacting the young learners we live to serve. He specializes in technology integration, place-based education, experiential learning and teaching, educational technology consulting, professional development, staff development, curriculum adaptation, creative teaching solutions, unique learning experiences. LucidPress is an online publishing tool that is free for students and staff that integrates into Google Drive. It enables anyone to create print and digital documents including newsletters, pamphlets, flyers, brochures, magazines and posters. Please join us to learn how LucidPress can be used in schools/classrooms.

EVO Minecraft MOOC at the free live Connecting Online CO15 Conferenc

Learning2gether Episode 259

On Sunday Feb 8 1300 GMT Jeff Kuhn and Vance Stevens presented EVO Minecraft MOOC at the free live Connecting Online CO15 Conference being held Friday, Saturday, and Sunday of that weekend. This was the first of a LEARNING2GETHER DOUBLEHEADER where Vance presented at consecutive CO15 and EVO Week 4 events

Sunday February 8

8 AM EST

Jeff Kuhn, Vance Stevens, and the EVOMC15 team

EVO Minecraft MOOC

EVO Minecraft MOOC is an innovative way to model professional development incorporating elements of gaming. This EVO session is based athttp://tinyurl.com/evomc15 and is ongoing at the present time. This presentation outlines the vision behind EVOMC15 and reports on progress and outcomes so far.

Recording: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476847-co15-evo-minecraft-mooc

Slides:

Leave comments on our EVO Minecraft mOOC event link:
https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/c30tdg0s9bmmlj2a2i1ctbiufqo

Announcements

Fri Feb 6 0800 EST through Sun Feb 8 CO15 free online conference

http://www.wiziq.com/course/48839-connecting-online-co15

CO15 Banner.png

Once upon a time you could just sign up to present here
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1s9TK1r3vpquIO0gBqmnZH3LgoN2Jf-DY4cbQT0-zNVs/edit

Here is the calendar
https://www.wiziq.com/tutorial/899705-co15-calendar-of-events

Here’s a list of webinars (with their links but without timings)
https://docs.google.com/document/d/10HzSb_QYbbb6kQoVAXqG9FyLJSX5GYQ1ZiG1hpXP1MI/edit

Fri Feb 6 Day 1 of Connecting Online 2015

Here are the recording links

Opening Ceremony http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2478489-co15-opening-ceremony-and-introductions
Collaborative Teamwork in an Online Learning Environment- Possibilities and Challenges https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2475156-co15-designing-and-evaluating-online-collaborative-projects-collaborative-teamwork-in-an-online-learning-environment-possib
The EVOlution of Jan and Electronic Village Online https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2475174-co15-the-evolution-of-jan-and-electronic-village-online
Copyrighting Cyberspace: Teaching Old Dogs New Clicks https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2475183-co15-copyrighting-cyberspace-teaching-old-dogs-new-clicks
Music, performance and creativity in language learning. Use the internet to run your own edutainment business! https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2500266-co15-charles-goodger-and-action-songs
Meeting in the Middle: Avoiding the Exploitative Pitfalls of Global Learning https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2478519-co15-meeting-in-the-middle-avoiding-the-exploitative-pitfalls
How digital Marking and Flashcards Can Engage and Motivate Students https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2475802-co15-how-digital-marking-and-flashcards-engage-and-motivate
Out of Time: Can Story Inspire Deeper Learning? https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2475813-co15-out-of-time-can-story-inspire-deeper-learning
From tech crappy to tech savvy https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2475950-co15-from-tech-crappy-to-tech-savvy
Learning Facilitation and hands on use of Internet applications for Virtual Education for Teachers https://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476165-co15-learning-facilitation-and-hands-on-use-of-internet-applications
Susan Hillyard on PLCs Forever http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476175-co15-susan-hillyard-on-plcs-forever

Sat Feb 7 from 1300 to midnight GMT Day 2 of Connecting Online 2015

Go to https://www.wiziq.com/tutorial/899705-co15-calendar-of-events and click on a session to get its WizIQ URL

Here are the links from Nellie’s announcement on the second day of CO15 as we partner for learning:

1. PoodLL on Moodle: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476712-co15-poodll-on-moodle

2. Organizational aspects in e-learning: the issue of knowledge management: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476713-co15-organizational-aspects-of-e-learning

3. Connecting Online to Improve Instructional Learning©: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476724-co15-connecting-online-to-improve-instructional-learning

4. Books on E-learning: Technology That Tutors:http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476735-co15-books-on-elearning-technology-that-tutors

5. Collaborative Online Learning: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476747-co15-collaborative-online-learning

6. Using Student Feedback for Continual Improvement of Your Online Course:http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476753-co15-student-feedback-for-continual-improvement-of-online-courses

7. Understanding Pair Work in Micro Teaching Online:http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476773-co15-understanding-pair-work-in-micro-teaching-online

8. The End of Online Learning – the Beginning of Mobile Acquiring Language Skills:http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2480120-co15-end-of-e-learning-and-into-mobile-acquisition-of-language-skills

9. Learning Based on Location- thewandering: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476808-co15-learning-based-on-location-thewandering

10. Setting Up and Running a MOOC on WizIQ: Lessons Learned and in Progress: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476812-co15-setting-up-and-running-a-mooc-on-wiziq

11. Dealing with difficult students in the online classroom: http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476836-co15-dealing-with-difficult-students-in-the-online-classroom

Sun Feb 8 from 1200 noon to midnight GMT Day 3 of Connecting Online 2015

Go to https://www.wiziq.com/tutorial/899705-co15-calendar-of-events and click on a session to get its WizIQ URL

Here are the links to all the events on this day and their recordings

Digital Literacy and Higher Education http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476838-co15-digital-literacy-and-higher-education
EVO Minecraft MOOC http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476847-co15-evo-minecraft-mooc
Our Peer-Reviewed World: where Evaluation by Peers Becomes the World of Social Media Overnight http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2478446-co15-peer-reviewed-world-where-evaluation-by-peers-becomes-the-world
Too many tools, too little time http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476903-co15-too-many-tools-too-little-time
Professional Learning Networks for Longlife Learners http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476935-co15-professional-learning-networks-for-longlife-learners
Collaboration through International Events for Knowledge Books http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476864-co15-english-teacher-s-technology-toolbox
Reaching All Learners in the Digital Age http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476913-co15-reaching-all-learners-in-the-digital-age
Byte Sized Possibilities That Transform Our Teaching http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476794-co15-byte-sized-possibilities-that-transform-our-teaching
Designing and Evaluating Online Collaborative Projects http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2474653-co15-designing-and-evaluating-online-collaborative-projects
Teaching Technology Tools for Collaboration in K-20 http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476784-co15-teaching-technology-tools-for-collaboration-in-k-20
Listening to Learners in Social Media http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2475604-co15-listening-to-learners-in-social-media
Closing Ceremony http://www.wiziq.com/online-class/2476788-co15-closing-ceremony

Learning2gether with Dave Dodgson and Jeff Kuhn – EVO Minecraft MOOC: Modifying the game for language learning

Learning2gether Episode 258


Download mp3 here:
https://learning2getherdotnet.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/learning2gether-with-evo-minecraft-mooc-modifying-the-game-for-language-learning-cvpi4_a0wce.mp3?

On Sun Feb 1 at 1400 GMT Learning2gether hosted an EVO Minecraft MOOC Hangout on Modifying the game for language learning. With us we had EVOMC15 co-moderators David Dodgson, Jeff Kuhn, and Vance Stevens

Dave Dodgson  planned to outline what his students at his former school were doing with Minecraft and what he’s been doing at his current school. He has two videos his former students made on Youtube which he has shared.

Now that the EVOMC15 particpants have tested the Minecraft waters Jeff wanted to talk about  modifications for the game (nothing too technical) so folks can get a glimpse into how Minecraft can really be tweaked for specific learning content.

We met in Hangout on Air, streamed on
http://webheadsinaction.org/live, archived here http://webheadsinaction.org/learning2gether-evo-minecraft-mooc-modifying-game-language-learning

It was interesting to hear Jeff’s and David’s perspectives on using Minecraft with students and on the benefits of gaming and advantages of Minecraft in supporting those benefits. It was especially interesting to hear how easily one could set up a Minecraft server for classroom use (David was running one on the teacher computer in his classroom, and Jeff thought I could run one from my laptop.

Meanwhile the agenda on Canvas Minecraft MOOC for this week is servers. You can join that MOOC here
https://www.canvas.net/courses/minecraft-for-educators

“Week 2 is all about servers; what they are, how to download them, install them and some things to watch out for along the way.” Here is the schedule:

  • Monday 2nd Feb: An introduction to servers – What they are and the different kinds that are out there.
  • Tuesday 3rd Feb: To host or not to host? LAN maybe your answer
  • Wednesday 4th Feb: Installing a Vanilla 1.8 Server
  • Thursday 5th Feb: Working with Bukkit
  • Friday 6th Feb: The world of Forge and MinecraftEDU

Technical footnote: There were connectivity problems with HoA in UAE. Dave was having them in Gabon. He dropped out of the call at least once. In Dubai, Tomas Lorincz struggled to get in and never quite stuck (he ended up listening to the stream). I got my first disconnects in Al Ain when I was setting up for the event. This prompted me to log onto another computer, which also started disconnecting, but at least I had two in the fray. I restarted both and got one to connect, and the other appeared to connect but did not show up on the first computer. Once we were under way the first HoA froze in my browser. I could hear and people told me they could hear and see me, but that browser had no functionality (for me to mute for example). The second computer kept dropping out, I kept refreshing it, but it never joined the HoA, except that when it came time to close the recording and there was no functionality on my frozen computer, the stop recording button worked on the one that wouldn’t actually let me in the HoA.

I think things went well as far as the other participants were concerned, Tilly and Sara joined us in the HoA, and Maha and Gil Mattos were present in the stream and said all was fine, and I think the recording is ok. But it was very strange and challenging to keep things going from where I was pushing plans B and C.

Earlier this week

Sun Jan 25 1400 GMT Learning2gether with EVO Minecraft MOOC and Snake Gaming

Spotlighting Filip and Marijana Smolčec

https://learning2gether.net/2015/01/25/learning2gether-with-evo-minecraft-mooc-and-snake-gaming/ 

Sun Jan 25 at 1600 GMT there were several EVO sessions happening same time in different spaces

ICT4ELT in Webheads Bb Collaborate – guest speaker Vicki Hollett on Making videos

in Blackboard Collaborate (Elluminate)

http://learningtimesevents.org/webheads/

Thanks to an ongoing grant from http://www.learningtimes.com/

The EVOlution of Jan

http://iateflyltsig.wiziq.com/online-class/2315322-the-evolution-of-jan

EVO Flipped Learning webcast on Screencasting and more

https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/ch9l8g0q6p3989itebn7q84e3qo?authkey=CJr8_pv07N3RGQ

Mon Jan 26 1330 GMT Maha Abdulmoneim on Becoming a Connected Educator live from Nile TESOL

https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/clsnhl7b9j69eapmm1v8ha2lab0?authkey=CNvsztLL4uSZbw

This is a Google doc  https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RBQCrtRs48d9luMrnYzzxhnrPBVnaNI-v2YDcnPVXFg/edit?usp=sharing that was created to share the different resources shared during the hangout, things the participants asked about and resources that +Maha Bali and Maha Abdelmoneim found and thought would be useful. Please feel free to add or correct etc 🙂

Kevin Hodgson”s Blog about the hangout http://dogtrax.edublogs.org/2015/01/27/when-connected/comment-page-1/#comment-10562

Thu Jan 29 Earthbridges interviewed Col. Joe Kittinger in Hangout for classrooms around the USA

Earthbridges.net brought Col. Joe Kittinger into classrooms around the USA, perhaps around the globe, on Thursday, January 29, 2015. He was the first person to jump from the stratosphere back in 1960! Join us when we interview him about his jump and other accomplishments during his life!

Archived at http://earthbridges.net/node/18477

2015-02-02_1637kittinger

On YouTube: http://youtu.be/LmqKGcyT82c

Fri Jan 30 Webinar with Vicki Loras

Most effective teachers have one thing in common: they make learning fun.
Join renowned educator, Vicky Loras, for Are Your Students Playing or Learning? –Both!,a free live webinar to learn how to make your classes more meaningful and engaging.
The webinar will take place on January 30th, 2015 at 6pm UTC. To join, click here: Enroll Free
In this fast-paced one-hour session, Vicky will share:
● Practical examples easily applied in any class
● A google document handout with useful information
● Interaction with attendees during and after the webinar
● Access to view and download the video recording of the webinar

EVO Minecraft MOOC meet and greet with Jeff Kuhn

Learning2gether Episode 255

Audio rendition of the YouTube recording


Download mp3 to your device:
https://learning2getherdotnet.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/wed-jan-14-1400-gmt-evo-minecraft-mooc-meet-and-greet-with-jeff-kuhn-tq2bbq-ywr4.mp3?

On Wed Jan 14 at 1400 GMT EVO Minecraft MOOC held a meet and greet with Jeff Kuhn. Also on hand were EVOMC15 co-moderators Marijana and Filip Smolcec and Vance and Bobbi Stevens. Jeff started us off by laying out the rationale for using games in the classroom, including statistics showing that the video gaming industry was worth five times as many billion dollars as the film industry, certainly not a medium to ignore. One game that has been doing quite well in that industry is Minecraft, and our discussion explored how it can be used in class and also explored a little of Minecraft itself thanks to a screen share from Bobbi’s computer.  Hope you enjoy the recording.

The event was in hangout https://plus.google.com/events/ca1koklkgg8369t20sjdojmsvco

Live streamed

Archived also at: http://webheadsinaction.org/learning2gether-evo-minecraft-mooc-meet-and-greet-jeff-kuhn

Further reading

About Jeff Kuhn and Dave Dodgeson, and Marijana and Filip #evomc15 co-moderators

Announcements

2015-01-18_1543kuhn

Followed on Fri Jan 16 by EVOMC15 Minecraft  sandbox

EVO Minecraft MOOC moderators and participants met at our Minecraft server for sandbox activities. On arrival were were able to press T to get a text chat in Minecraft, but we quickly established a Skype call so we could communicate hands free in voice chat.

Participants had got themselves white-listed on the server by joining and entering their MC handles in this Google Doc
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yRbAzdndRFncpckurKLf5s2b95Z1-Tksclmw1A8Jq7Y/edit

Voice and text back channel

We set up the event using http://doodle.com to produce the best times for us to meet

Here’s a taste of some of the shenanegans

2015-01-16_16.54.50carol_horse 2015-01-18_1935awsome

2015-01-18_1937tamas

Filip’s remarkable video, referred to in Tamas’s post

And kudos to Barbi

on the most advanced build and tutorial on how to escape it created by any of us noobs!

What next?

This seems to have worked well for us. Now that we’ve established proof of concept, how about someone else try and set up a sandbox meeting at a time convenient for them, and let the rest of us join you if we’re available.