CIOB mines for next generation of construction workers

As part of its efforts to attract the next generation of construction workers, the Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) has released its Craft Your Future lessons on all versions of Minecraft.

Teachers, construction professionals, and young people will able to use ‘vanilla’ versions of Craft Your Future developed by the CIOB and learn about the value of construction management through Minecraft.

The lessons are targeted at 12 to 14 year olds and take place in Newtown, a specially created virtual city in Minecraft, to design, plan, collaborate and build solutions that develop a sustainable future for all its citizens.

The lessons cover four areas of construction, maintenance, restoration, new build and refurbishment and allow users to take on real life scenarios such as restoring Battersea Power Station.

In collaboration with The Gameworkshop from Denmark and the Danish Architecture Centre, each CIOB lesson lasts between three and six hours and will see groups of students work together usually in teams of three or four.

Bridget Bartlett Deputy Chief Executive at the CIOB said: “There are 16 hours of lessons freely available for teachers, CIOB members and other professionals to use in the classroom.  We want as many people as possible to have access to these lessons and have worked hard to develop a solution that works on all Minecraft platforms not just Minecraft Education.

“The beauty of Minecraft and our lessons is that they are open source. Anyone wanting to teach them can and has access to all the supporting tools they will need. We are already seeing a mixture of construction employers and schools in the UK and the US using these lessons to inspire the next generation of construction managers.”

The influence of Minecraft has seen the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (Northern Ireland) announce that it will provide free licenses to over 200 schools and 30 libraries in Northern Ireland to engage young people in city planning and construction.

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