by Epaminondas Christophilopoulos, Androniki Papaterpou, George Profitiliotis & Charalambos Christophilopoulos
1. Introduction
This article aims to provide the initial insights of using the ‘Thing from The Future Minecraft: Education Edition’ with secondary school students. The game was tested in the context of a specific futures lab offered and delivered in schools around Greece by the UNESCO Chair on Futures Research.
The three-hour program is partly based upon the Future Day material developed by the Teach the Future network and includes an introduction to Futures Studies, discussion, hands-on exercises, and participatory activities.
This essay focuses on the first pilot testing of a novel digital version of the ‘Thing from the Future’ based on the Minecraft Education edition and aims to take advantage of the unique characteristics of the Minecraft game.
2.The ‘Thing from the Future Minecraft Education Edition’
2.1 The ‘Thing from the Future’
The ‘Thing from the Future’ is an awarded foresight tool and imagination exercise in the form of a deck of cards, developed by Stuart Candy & Jeff Watson (Situation Lab, 2015). To date, it has been played by thousands of people worldwide in various settings (Candy, 2018).
The original design of the game consists of a deck of four types of cards (Candy, 2018):
- Arc is the applicable time horizon and type of future, building on Dator’s four futures archetypes (Dator, 2009) (Figure 1): Continued Growth, Collapse, Disciplined Society, and Transformational Society
- Terrain is the context for the object, either a physical location or domain of human activity.
- Object is the category of the hypothetical future thing (poster, tool, map, etc.).
- Mood reveals what it is the feeling when interacting with the hypothetical thing.`
Figure 1: Dator’s Four futures
A creative prompt comprises any set of four cards, one from each category (Figure 2). Each combination challenges players to imagine a future that often contrasts basic anticipatory assumptions creatively. For example, check Figure 2. This combination requests players to imagine and describe an item coming from a thirty-year-long future of continuous growth; it resembles a postcard that is somehow related to education and causes some excitement.
Figure 2: An example prompt from the original four card design of ‘Thing from the Future’.
2.2. Minecraft: Education Edition
Minecraft is a video game developed by Markus Persson and initially published by Mojang in 2011 (Wikipedia, 2021). The game allows players to construct out of textured cubes a three-dimensional world. Activities include exploration, resource gathering, and creating. Individual and multi-player modes are available. Microsoft acquired Minecraft in 2014. Over 121 million copies of the game have been sold, making it second only to Tetris in best-selling games (Wikipedia, 2021).
The Minecraft: Education Edition is an educational version of the game, released in 2016, specifically designed for classroom use and contains specific features that make Minecraft easy to use in a classroom setting (Minecraft Wiki, n.d.). Creating an educational tool in a game environment is not a surprise, as research confirms that our brains are ‘wired for pleasure’ (Biederman & Vessel, 2006) and that games are an effective way to learn because they simulate adventure and keep our brains engaged and happy.
Thus, Minecraft Education is not the only tool of game-based learning. However, it offers educators numerous possibilities while promoting creativity, collaboration, and problem-solving in a highly immersive environment. The Minecraft Education Edition website (https://education.minecraft.net/en-us/resources/explore-lessons ) hosts hundreds of lessons and downloadable worlds in all core school subjects (science, math, computer science, languages, history & culture, art & design), as well in topics like digital citizenship, equity and inclusion.
2.3. ‘Thing from the Future Minecraft Education Edition’
The ‘Thing from the Future Minecraft Education Edition’ (Figure 3) was created by Charalampos Christophilopoulos and Epaminondas Christophilopoulos, aiming to step upon the concept of the original four-card game design (Candy & Watson, 2014; Situation Lab, 2015) and create a novel version in the Minecraft world. The aim of creating this new game design was twofold: first, to offer a novel digital version in a familiar gaming environment and second, to specifically benefit from all the additional advantages offered by Minecraft Education Edition.
Figure 3: Screenshot from the ‘Thing for the Future’ Minecraft Education Edition
In addition, taking advantage of all the particular characteristics of Minecraft Education Edition, the hypothesis was that this game version would combine the advantages of both platforms, and it will:
a) Be more familiar with individuals that are used to communicating and expressing themselves in a gaming environment.
b) Boost creativity and imagination, as these are central in the design of Minecraft.
c) Enhance cooperation, allowing the players to interact, co-develop an idea, and practically build together the ‘Thing from the Future’ in Minecraft’s environment.
d) Allow players to question elementary anticipatory assumptions like basic physical laws; for example, in Minecraft, there is no gravity.
Of course, the above hypotheses are backed by theory. Learning theorist, Seymour Papert’s research in MIT, has illustrated that students often learn better when they engage in all the following (Harel, 2016):
- Use tech-empowered learning tools and computational environments
- Take active roles of designers and builders
- Learn in a social setting, with helpful mentors and coaches, or over networks
Even more importantly, game-based learning meets students where they are and where they want to be: engaged in play that challenges them, given room to be creative and ‘fail forward’ and taking risks that iterate along the way (Harel, 2016).
The Minecraft edition of the ‘Thing from the Future’ is a downloadable world, an island, that includes all the essential game elements, allowing the players to start playing after a short initial introduction by the facilitator. This novel edition of the game is freely available for download at the UNESCO Chair’s website (https://www.futures.gr/en/2020/05/27/things-from-the-futures-minecraft-education/), and can be played in any pc/mac with Minecraft Education Edition installed.
The ‘Thing from the Future’ world consists of three main areas:
1) a landing terrace where the player is welcomed and receives all the basic information about the game’s rules, purpose, and creators.
2) a temple (Figure 4), the Oracle, where the player receives the four clues for the thing coming from the future, that is: Arc, Terrain, Object, and Mood
3) a construction area for building the ‘Thing from the Future’.
The game also offers the option to take a photo from the constructed item, while there is an option to export and 3D print it, allowing the creation of physical easy-to-display items.
Figure 4: The Oracle and the construction area: screenshot from the ‘Thing for the Future Minecraft Education Edition’
3. Pilot testing
The traditional design of the ‘Thing from the Future’ is regularly used by the UNESCO Chair on Futures Research[1], in various settings and foresight workshops. Also, using the original four-card design, a Greek version of the game has been produced ‘Το Αντικείμενο από το Μέλλον’ (UNESCO Chair on Futures Research, 2019) and has been part of a series of Futures Labs delivered to secondary school students in Greece.
The specific series of workshops for students in Greek schools is partly based on the Future Day material developed by Laura Pouru, Otto Tähkäpää, Minna. Koskelo, and Annina Antinranta (2020) and has a total duration of three hours. The program is reviewed by the Institute of Educational Policy (Ministry of Education and Religious Affairs) and is approved for public schools around Greece.
The Minecraft edition was produced in 2020, but all physical workshops were halted due to the Covid-19 pandemic, so the first pilot testing took place at the Mandoulides Gymnasium in April 2021 (Mandoulides School, 2021). The school was selected in cooperation with Microsoft Hellas between schools that systematically use Minecraft Education Edition as a teaching tool.
The Futures Lab (Figure 5) was delivered to around 25 third grade gymnasium students (~15 years old) and included the typical steps/phases of the program delivered to schools:
- Phase 1: Polak game, introduction on futures studies, selection of exploration topic, identification of trends, megatrends, weak signals, and black swans.
- Phase 2: ‘Thing from the Future’ game.
- Phase 3: Impact Assessment and draft scenarios.
Figure 5: The Futures Lab at the Mandoulides Gymnasium
In this case study, before Phase 2 of the Futures Lab, the students were asked to choose if they would like to play the physical card version of the ‘Thing from the Future’ or the Minecraft Education version, and two similar size groups of students were formed.
The first group used the Greek version of the ‘Thing from the Future’ (UNESCO Chair on Futures Research, 2019), and the students, in a collaborative process, created things from the future and presented them using Lego blocks or using coloured markers (Figure 6).
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Figure 6: Creations from the card version of ‘The Thing from the Future’.
At the same time, the second group of students was working either alone or in couples, producing things from the future inside the immersive environment of Minecraft (Figure 7).
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Figure 7: Creations from the Minecraft version of the ‘Thing from the Future’.
The actual time available to students for understanding and testing the game was limited (around 25 minutes). Nevertheless, after a quick briefing of the rules and objectives, the learning curve was extremely short (compared to other physical sessions), and the students started quickly exploring the Minecraft world and constructing things from the future.
The main observations that came up from this first pilot testing of the Minecraft Education edition of the ‘Thing from the Future’, are the following:
-Students enthusiastically welcomed the use of Minecraft in the context of the workshop, and the same feedback was received during the whole session.
– It was easier for students to start working on imaginary futures, maybe due to the particular characteristics of the Minecraft game that match the elements of the ‘Thing from the Future’: imaginary environment, creative mode welcoming the construction of objects, etc.
-This digital version seemed to work better for individuals familiar with expressing themselves in digital gaming environments.
-Minecraft allowed players to question elementary anticipatory assumptions like basic physical laws.
-Students familiar with Minecraft were able to make good use of the game capabilities and created demanding and creative items.
Due to time limitations, it was not possible to test the interaction between players and collaborative building, which needs further testing.
4. Epilogue
This Minecraft Education Edition pilot testing for the ‘Thing from The Future’ has confirmed our basic assumptions that this game version can prove extremely useful for running workshops with individuals who prefer to interact in digital environments. Furthermore, Minecraft proved to be a perfect match for the ‘Thing from the Future’, facilitating the questioning of various anticipatory assumptions of the physical world. Nevertheless, further testing is necessary to test collaborative work and compare outcomes for a group to test both game versions (physical and digital).
So, the next steps for the team include further testing of the Minecraft game version with more students’ groups of various ages and a comparison of the user experiences of playing both the physical and digital versions. It would also be interesting to test the option offered by the game to retrieve and print the created future items using a 3D printer, thus bringing to life the imagined speculative items. Furthermore, the team plans to use the Minecraft platform for experiential futures applications and visualizing future scenarios produced in various research projects.
Note
- UNESCO Chair on Futures Research, Foundation for Research and Technology Hellas (FORTH), Thessaloniki, Greece ↑
References
Biederman, I., & Vessel, E. (2006). Perceptual Pleasure and the Brain. American Scientist, 94(3), 247, https://doi.org/10.1511/2006.59.247
Candy, S. (2018). Gaming Futures Literacy: The Thing From the Future. In R. Miller (Ed.), Transforming the Future (Open Access): Anticipation in the 21st Century (1 edition, pp. 213–225). Routledge.
Candy, S. and Watson, J. (2014) The Thing from the Future (card game). Toronto: Situation Lab, http://situationlab.org/prοject/the-thing-from-the-future/
Dator, J. (2009). Alternative Futures at the Manoa School, Journal of Future Studies,14(2), pp. 1-18.
Harel, I. (2016). A Glimpse Into the Playful World of Seymour Papert. EdSurge. https://www.edsurge.com/news/2016-08-03-a-glimpse-into-the-playful-world-of-seymour-papert
Mandoulides School. (2021). Αλφαβητισμός του Μέλλοντος. Μαντουλίδη Εκπαιδευτήρια, https://mandoulides.edu.gr/2021/06/02/alfavitismos-toy-mellontos/
Minecraft Wiki. (n.d.). Education Edition. Minecraft Wiki. Retrieved September 1, 2021, https://minecraft.fandom.com/wiki/Education_Edition
Miller, A. (2016). Ideas for Using Minecraft in the Classroom. Edutopia, https://www.edutopia.org/blog/minecraft-in-classroom-andrew-miller
Pouru,L., Tähkäpää, O., Koskelo, M. and Antinranta A. (2020). Futures Day, https://tulevaisuuspaiva.fi/in-english/
Situation Lab (2015) #FutureThing Print-and-Play Edition, http://situationlab.org/futurething-print-and-play-edition/
UNESCO Chair on Futures Research (2019). Το Αντικείμενο από το Μέλλον (The Thing From the Future), https://www.futures.gr/2019/01/04/thing-from-the-future/
Wikipedia. (2021). Minecraft, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minecraft
