As we head into the new school year, we're excited to announce that the full version of Minecraft: Education Edition will be available to purchase on November 1. For educators interested in trying the new title in their classroom for free before purchasing, the early access version of Minecraft: Education Edition will still be available for free through November 1.
In June, Minecraft: Education Edition launched in early access to students and educators around the world. Over 35,000 students and educators have participated in this program and provided feedback to help us fine-tune the experience across a diverse set of learning environments, including a STEM summer camp program in New York City and classrooms around the world.
Minecraft: Education Edition continues to be built on feedback from the educator community and features and capabilities they have told us are important to enhancing the learning experience. While we debuted several of these features with early access in June, we're excited to roll out even more key capabilities in November, including:
The Classroom Mode is a companion app for Minecraft: Education Edition that enables educators to manage world settings, communicate with students, give items and teleport students in the Minecraft world. It displays a map view of the Minecraft world, a list of all the students in the world, a set of world management settings and a chat window. There is even a Minecraft clock to show time of day in the world. Classroom Mode offers educators the ability to interact with students and manage settings from a central user interface.
Microsoft will continue to update Minecraft: Education Edition to include new game features from other editions of Minecraft. All the latest updates to Minecraft: Windows 10 Edition beta will be included, such as leads and horses, additional player skins, pistons and the remainder of Redstone functionality and an updated user interface.
"Once I understood the fact that teachers don't have to be experts or gamers, I got started in Minecraft. Let the students be the experts - they are a great resource. I love how working in Minecraft makes my students engage in, reflect on and talk about history - or any subject, really!" says educator Katja Borregaard.
We're committed to releasing the highest quality product that is reliable and secure to use in classrooms around the world, and we will continue to improve Minecraft: Education Edition with each release.
Those new to using Minecraft in the classroom can also check out education.minecraft.net, which includes lesson plans, starter worlds, a tutorial experience, and the Minecraft Mentors program, which connects educators with others experienced in teaching with Minecraft. Explore ideas and lesson plans created by educators covering topics from storytelling and poetry to city planning, sustainable living and geometry.
The complete version of Minecraft: Education Edition will be available for purchase on November 1st and will be available for $5 per user, per year, or through a district-wide licensing model. To begin using Minecraft: Education Edition early access:
Upgrade your computer to Windows 10 or OS X El Capitan
Sign up for a free Office 365 Education account using your school or district email
Download Minecraft: Education Edition and start playing!
For more information and resources on Minecraft: Education Edition, and to sign up for updates, please visit education.minecraft.net. We look forward to continuing this journey together.