by Stone Marshall | Nov 13, 2014 | Minecraft News |
Phil Spencer, head of Microsoft’s Xbox division, discussed the tech giant’s plans for the “Minecraft” game series, according to Game Spot.
In mid-September of this year, it was reported that Microsoft purchased “Minecraft” developer Mojang AB for $2.5 billion. Although the deal is not yet final, the acquisition caused fans of the game to worry about the franchise’s fate, Wall Street Journal reported.
According to Spencer, Microsoft purchased the developer because it thinks “Minecraft” will be a great addition to its roster of games.
“It’s a big deal,” he said about the acquisition. “For me, I look at it as a great game to add to our portfolio. I love [the gamer] who plays ‘Minecraft.’ I love that male, female, young and old – it’s something that lives on so many different screens. I’d love to bring it to more screens out there.”
As Microsoft’s first plan for “Minecraft,” Spencer said the company wants to unify the game’s different versions using Xbox Live. However, he didn’t clarify if this includes versions for rival consoles such as Sony’s PlayStation and PlayStation Vita.
“I think what we’ve learned through Xbox Live is something that we can help in unifying a little bit of what happens with ‘Minecraft’ today,” he said. “If I’m on PC I get access to the mod servers; if I’m on console or the mobile editions, I don’t.”
“We’re looking at how do we bring that whole system together a little more,” Spencer added. “Because there are other games out there that let me move from screen to screen fairly seamlessly.”
Regarding the possibility of developing “Minecraft 2,” Spencer said there are no plans yet to create a sequel. Microsoft will first focus on catering to the needs and desires of the first game’s gaming community before moving on with a second installment, VG247 reported.
“I don’t know if ‘Minecraft 2,’ if that’s the thing that makes the most sense,” he said. “The community around ‘Minecraft’ is as strong as any community out there. We need to meet the needs and desires of what the community has before we get permission to go off and do something else.”
“We look at Job 1 is to go out and meet the needs of the ‘Minecraft’ community first, and then we can think about ways that we can actually help grow it,” Spencer continued. “That’s our sole focus.”
by Stone Marshall | Nov 12, 2014 | parent-news |
Annabelle Howard, the founder of a nonprofit organization called Big Fun Education, is showing the world how the internet can and should change the way kids learn.
It’s not about looking facts up on the web. It’s about connecting kids with other kids and people that they could never have worked with before the internet. And her choice of internet tools is Google+ and Google’s videoconferencing tool, Hangouts.
For instance, using Google+ and Hangouts she has:
- Connected middle schoolers from Scotland with students from North Carolina to teach them what the accents in Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” are actually supposed to sound like.
- Helped coordinate one-on-one reading sessions between students and adults from all different backgrounds.
- Recruited two chefs from Trinidad and England to walk students through the menu of a medieval feast, while coaching them on how to make marzipan in real-time.
- Produced a video on the feast that reached an astounding 27 million people.
Those activities came through two of Big Fun Education’s programs: Macbeth Goes Social and Reading Without Borders.
Macbeth Goes Social coordinates live readings and performances of the play Macbeth with students from around the world.
Reading Without Borders connects adults with students to read books about things the kids are passionate about.
Howard says her goal is to make theatre accessible and fun for everyone and to get students interested in reading.
“Everybody loves feeling connected,” Howard tells Business Insider. “It’s almost addictive.”
Google+Two students who participated in a Big Fun Education program.
She started Big Fun Education in 2011, after working for many years as a teacher and publishing almost 30 classic drama adaptations that came with board games. She and her partner, Forrest Stone, wanted to find a way to bring those adaptations digital. They wanted to find a way to use social sharing tools to bring them to as many kids as possible.
She plugged into Google’s Connected Classroom Google+ community and found more teachers than she ever expected willing to give her idea a shot. She eventually created her own Google+ community for Big Fun Education that now has more than 500 followers.
Once she saw how much kids came alive and engaged with the literature when acting out her plays with other students through Hangouts, she wanted to try to see if she could find other ways to get them reading. After she put out a call for willing readers, the volunteers poured in.
She has now connected students and adults in more than 37 countries.
Through Macbeth Goes Social, she has seen kids interact with plays they had previously found boring. Through Reading Without Borders, she’s watched kids who hated reading get excited about books. The readers become mini-mentors, all through using Google Hangouts.
“In this day and age, where everything is known or could be known with a click or a search, we’ve got to remember how to be human,” she says. “It’s not all information. It’s about relating to each other. It’s about telling stories. It’s about listening as well as speaking. That can be magic.”
by Stone Marshall | Nov 12, 2014 | parent-news |
The motto of Disneyland is “The Happiest Place on Earth,” but if you’re looking for a happy place closer to home, visit the picture book room at Seymour Library. Come on a Tuesday or Wednesday morning during story time, and you’ll hear kids singing, clapping their hands and shouting out answers. It’s not always noisy during story time, of course — sometimes you’ll hear next to nothing, because the kids are listening intently to a story, waiting for the page to turn and reveal what happens next.
Come another time and you’ll find grandparents reading to grandkids, and moms and dads helping their little ones pick out books to take home. Stop by on a quiet afternoon, and if you’re lucky, you’ll see one of our favorite things: a preschooler who has carefully arranged all the stuffed animals in a semicircle on the rug and is sitting in front of them, reading them a story. It’s story time for Curious George, Clifford and the many stuffed bears who make the picture book room their home.
It’s a magical place, the picture book room. It’s decorated with brightly colored posters and furnished with pint-sized chairs. It’s filled with animals who talk, pirates and princesses, hungry caterpillars and cats in hats. And November, which is Picture Book Month, is a good time to talk about the real magic of picture books, and what happens when you read them to children.
They learn all kinds of things.
Reading aloud is the single most important thing a parent can do to help a child learn. There’s a nationwide movement to get every parent to read to their child every day for just 15 minutes; you can learn more about it at readaloud.org.
The goal of the Read Aloud campaign is to have every child arrive at kindergarten ready to learn. Every time you read to your child, you’re improving their ability to learn. Read to a child just 15 minutes every day, and that child will enter kindergarten at age 5 having more than 450 hours of reading time.
That’s a big advantage for a child. All that reading time gives a child a better vocabulary, and the number of words that a child knows upon entering kindergarten is a key predictor of success. It also builds a child’s skills in phonics, comprehension and other literacy skills.
Unfortunately, most kids don’t get this kind of preparation. Fewer than half of all children are read to every day. Some children come to school with as many as 1,000 hours of reading time. Some come with as few as 25. That’s an awfully big gap to close.
Reading together builds literacy skills. It teaches kids about colors and shapes and letters and numbers. It helps them learn about friendship and family relationships, and it helps them develop empathy.
And aside from all this, reading together is a pleasure. We have books that are laugh-out-loud funny, and books that leave you with a warm feeling long after the final page. If you need ideas for books to read to your child, just ask. But we suspect that it won’t take long to find ones you like if you just browse around the picture book room, our happiest place on earth.
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by Stone Marshall | Nov 12, 2014 | parent-news |
A third of British children now have their own tablet, according to the latest figures from communications regulator Ofcom. It’s a fair bet that those devices will be getting plenty of usage during half-term, which is this week in many parts of England.
Not as a replacement for physical activities – from painting and reading to climbing trees or riding bikes – but to complement them, with digital creativity, storytelling and education for children’s downtime.
Wondering what to download if your children are using Android devices? Here are some recommendations of recent releases that are well worth a look. And please chip in with your own recommendations in the comments section.
Developer Toca Boca is a reliable source of inventive, playful children’s apps, and Toca Mini is the current favourite of my own kids. It involves creating mini dolls using colour, stamps and facial parts, with huge scope for creativity whether they’re making new characters or modelling their favourites from TV or books. It also proved a spur for my children to try making figures in the real world too, once the tablet had been put away.
Eric Carle’s book about a caterpillar who chomps its way through… well, just about every foodstuff in sight remains a classic. Its latest incarnation is an app from developer StoryToys. Rather than mirror the original story, it tries to add something new with a series of mini-games involving counting, sorting and memory. The graphics do a great job of bringing Carle’s iconic illustrations to life.
This is brand new from MakieLab, the British startup that mixes 3D-printed dolls with mobile games. It’s a fashion-oriented game for children, encouraging them to create clothes for their virtual characters and then send them down a catwalk – complete with a photography feature. It’s just as well-crafted as the real dolls that the company sells.
Moonbot Studios work across apps and animation, and had one of the first big children’s hits on iOS with their The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore app back in the day. Fireflies is part of their new series of apps though, with Android support from the start. It’s a playful mission to catch fireflies in a forest, collecting them in a jar and mixing up their colours. A relaxing treat for young children.
Available in the UK, this is the second official app from the BBC’s pre-school TV channel CBeebies, focusing on stories rather than the games in its CBeebies Playtime app. This time, the emphasis is on six stories based on popular shows: Something Special, Charlie and Lola, The Octonauts, Old Jack’s Boat, Show Me Show Me and Grandpa in My Pocket. It’s easy enough for young children to use, but includes reading development information for parents.
I grew up with the Beano in printed form, but my children have discovered Dennis and friends through Me Comics, which is a sign of the times. It’s part digital-comics store and part reader app, with individual comics sold for 69p and up as in-app purchases (the “IAP” above). The selection includes an array of Disney characters as well as Transformers and My Little Pony, with a fun feature enabling kids and parents to record their own voices for the narration.
US developer Originator made its name with the marvellous Endless Alphabet app, and this is the follow-up. It teaches “sight words” through a mixture of interactivity and animation: children drag letters in to place to spell the words, before seeing a troop of colourful monsters act them out. Its humour bears many repeated viewings, while its in-app purchases for new word packs are under parents’ control.
Developer TribePlay has a growing collection of Dr Panda apps, which are well worth exploring. This is one of the most recent: a sequel that sees children cooking up a storm in their own restaurant. There are more than 20 digital ingredients to experiment with, and various cooking methods from boiling to frying. Again, it’s an app that may – if my children are any guide – encourage your kids to help out in your real kitchen. For better or worse…
There’s real craft and charm to this app, just like its predecessors Fiete, Fiete Match and Fiete Christmas. It’s set on a farm, with children helping the three characters go about their daily tasks: feeding animals, shearing sheep, milking cows and so on. It’s relaxed, lovely to look at, and the perfect follow-up to visiting a farm in the real world.
The founder of developer Mighty Yeti Studios used to make shows for Nickelodeon and Disney, and you can see that pedigree in his company’s first Android app. This is a storybook with a pleasingly-sideways sense of humour, as Mr Cupcake sets off to a friend’s birthday party while puzzling over a strange crunching noise. There’s plenty of things to tap on, and plenty to laugh at too.
Tynker is one of the growing number of apps aiming to get children interested in computer programming. Here, that involves completing more than 200 “puzzle adventures” that introduce logic, loops and subroutines in an accessible way. A separate creation mode then gets children to start making their own games, using the skills that they’ve learned. This isn’t about shoving kids into coding to turn them into the next rich startup founder – it’s about having fun in a creative way.
This isn’t an app that you download from the Google Play store: it’s a website designed to work within tablets’ web browsers. It’s a fab idea though: a creative community based around a zoo full of magical animals that children draw themselves, with digital story-books that unlock featuring them, and a light gaming element where they defend the zoo from invaders. It’s free to use, but as parents you can choose to pay £5 a month or £27 for permanent access for all your children – which gets them a physical Fan Club pack sent through the post.
That’s a dozen to get you started, with some recommendations from previous roundups in the links below. But if your children have been enjoying other Android apps, please do tell other parents about them by posting a comment.
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