Yet Another Game to Spread Violence: Minecraft Education Edition

Video games cause violence. That’s just a proven fact if you choose to listen to the mainstream media. Donald Trump says it does, and so do dozens of “experts” both on Fox News and CNN. Let’s look at what the new violence-spreading game looks like.

Video Games and Violence

Mothers and fathers of America and beyond know three things for certain: don’t eat veggies when you can grill some steak, don’t buy anything on the Internet, or you’ll get your identity stolen, and don’t let your kids play video games, or they’ll become mass shooters.

As grim as the topic is, you can’t but be ironic about it. It’s the video games that cause violence in real life, not real-life trauma. It’s not that kids who grow into murderers are treated poorly by their parents and peers. It’s not that they have severe depression and anger issues because of it. It’s not that they hate the whole world and have no one to talk to, no way of relieving their pain. No, it’s much simpler than that. It’s just that video games make them do it.

Surely, you could easily follow the “monkey see monkey do” logic. A kid sees violence in a game, and a kid copies it. And it’s true — kids copy a lot of what they see. It’s only natural to blame violence on games like Doom or Carmageddon, with CS: GO and Fortnite being the latest scapegoats. Not really.

Minecraft’s Sins

You wouldn’t believe it, but Minecraft is among the games people blame for violence and deaths. To someone who has probably seen the death of tens of thousands of mobs and online players, Minecraft is the least likely game you’d blame for teen violence. However, you’re not the one judging.

In Turkey, the ministry of family affairs wanted to ban Minecraft in 2015 because it featured lots of violence. Since Turkey is very religious, the fact that the game has undead skeletons and zombies probably had to do something with the ministry’s decision as well. They’d be shocked if they saw Doom Eternal.

Minecraft was also blamed for the rise and spread of “sickening suicide games.” What was the fuss about? A silly Minecraft mod where Momo chases players. That was so “sickening” that Microsoft had to step in and eradicate the vicious mod.

What is Minecraft Back to School Edition

Here’s another Minecraft mod, not as sickening this time. Is it going to spread violence? Let’s find out what you can do in the game.

Explore biodiversity with WWF

Minecraft is so popular these days that it struck a deal with none other than World Wildlife Fund themselves. The latest installments of the game added so many species that WWF took this opportunity to partner up with Mojang and teach kids about biodiversity.

It goes beyond simply walking around different biomes and looking at animals, though. In one of the educational mods you can download, kids will be finding smugglers and preventing them from killing off Minecraft wildlife.

Learn history the right way

If you remember your early school days, you must know that learning history was a nuisance. You had to remember all these dates, names, and places that made no sense to you. Well, one of the mods in Minecraft Education Edition turns the history lesson upside down and gamifies it. Kids will have the opportunity to walk around 1 to 2 recreation of ancient Baghdad made with all historical accuracy Minecraft allows.

Teach math visually

Math is hard to understand for kids because they aren’t really good with abstractions yet. How do you change it? You make it as visual and pragmatic as you can. Minecraft Education Edition has dozens of mods that teach young kids everything from decimals to the coordinate system. You can actually run and fly around the coordinate system to get a sense of what’s it all about.

Do experiments

Minecraft’s chemistry pack allows kids to do experiments without the need for buying tons of equipment for the lab. They can recreate all the basic chemical reactions in the game.

Creative storytelling

Being a low-resolution sandbox, Minecraft is perfect for letting your imagination go loose. Minecraft Education Edition team built on that and created worlds for kids to explore and create stories about. This mechanical world is not just beautiful, it’s intriguing. It’ll keep kids guessing what’s behind the next corner and strike a sparkle of creativity in them. Who knows, maybe in the future you won’t even have to buy college papers for them because they’ll be smart enough to write those themselves!

Learn to code

Coding is among the most valuable skills today. Minecraft released a Code Builder update to help kids grasp the most basic concepts of coding early on. They’ll have the opportunity to program elements of the Minecraft world and create algorithms.