literacy | Liam O'Donnell

Teacher’s Guide: Organizing student accounts on a school Minecraft server

by liam | Apr 8, 2012 | education, gamebasedlearning, gaming, literacy, media, video games

One of the questions I get asked a lot is how do you organize your students’ accounts for your school’s Minecraft server. There are many ways to do this, but this is the way I organized my students’ Minecraft accounts. I’m sure there are more...

Teacher’s Guide to setting up a Minecraft server at your school

by liam | Mar 31, 2012 | education, gamebasedlearning, gaming, literacy, media, video games, virtual worlds

In early 2011, I set up a small multi-player Minecraft server in my school library, using school computers. In early 2012, I set up a second multi-player Minecraft server as part of our much larger Multi-School Minecraft Server Project, a single server hosting 30...

Warning: Using Minecraft in class could result in spontaneous, self-directed learning

by liam | Dec 3, 2011 | education, gamebasedlearning, literacy, media, video games, virtual worlds

Last year, I had the unique chance to use Minecraft with a small group of students who came to me three days a week for literacy support. It was a messy, fun three months and the kids did a lot of writing and researching outside the game, driven by their explorations...

How Twinkle Fingers turned my classroom into a General Assembly

by liam | Nov 26, 2011 | education, literacy, media

When teachers have discussions with their students in over-crowded classrooms, shouting, calling out and talking over others can become an unfortunate part of the process. But I recently figured out it doesn’t have to be. And I have the 99% to thank. The recent...

Talking Minecraft with Teachers Teaching Teachers

by liam | Aug 23, 2011 | appearances, education, gamebasedlearning, gaming, literacy, media, video games, virtual worlds

Last May, as the school year was winding up, I took part in a great podcast over at Teachers Teaching Teachers to talk about using video games in the classroom. Lucky for you interweb peeps, you can listen to the podcast here. The show centered around the release of...