Talking about Minecraft for math? How exciting for middle school students!

The focus of this lesson would be on the concept of volume while using the popular game of Minecraft. Students will be given the task of designing a classroom Minecraft city. Students would be presented with buildings that need to have their volume identified in order to figure out how many blocks it will take to recreate the building. For one building, students will be given the dimensions with which they can use the algorithm to solve. For another building, students will be given the volume and need to identify the dimensions. The last building students will identify is one they would create on their own as a group. For this building, students will design it, figure out what dimensions they would like it to be, calculate the building’s volume, and lastly think about what the building would be used for in the city.

Students would be provided with pictures of the buildings to base their calculations on as well as inspiration for how they would like their final building to look. Students will also be provided with manipulatives which they can use to construct the buildings to better help them visualize the dimensions and volume. After students have designed and calculated their final building, their task as a group would be to draw their building so it can be presented to the class. The students would give a short explanation of how they designed their building, why they chose the dimensions they did, how they made their calculations, and what their building would be used for in the city.

Standards addressed include:

CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.6.G.A.2: Find the volume of a right rectangular prism with fractional edge lengths by packing it with unit cubes of the appropriate unit fraction edge lengths, and show that the volume is the same as would be found by multiplying the edge lengths of the prism.

Grade 6 GLE: 1.1.2: Applies, analyzes, and creates the elements shape and form when producing a work of art.