Students build ACS(I) campus on Minecraft
Students who visited Anglo-Chinese School (Independent) for its open house activities did not set foot on the red bricks of the assembly square. Instead, they walked on digital blocks in a virtual rendition of the campus in Minecraft.
With school activities limited due to the Covid-19 outbreak, students got creative with a way to welcome potential students to their campus online.
A group of 18 students, mostly from the Robotics Technology Society, spent around 1,500 hours recreating the campus for players to tour on the sandbox video game.
Club president Aloysius Wong, 17, first conceived the idea when he saw videos other schools built online.
The Year Five student told The New Paper: “Since we had time during home-based learning, I got a group of us to start building.”
While his friends were familiar with Minecraft, where players gather materials to build structures from their imagination, they had never attempted a project on such a scale.
Communicating via chatrooms, the group referred to Google Maps to gauge the proportions of the buildings and pictures for the details, recreating most of the main areas in school.
Aloysius said the toughest part was getting the curves of the buildings right, given the blocky nature of the games’ aesthetic.
He said: “Many times we wanted to give up because it took a long time.”
More than 500 ACS(I) students visited the Minecraft server when it was launched on June 1.
The school decided to adopt the creation as part of their e-open house activities, which began on July 4.
Mr Foo Kam Meng, director of information and communication technology (ICT) who is in charge of the robotics club, said educators are always looking into more ways to teach through games as it imparts resilience and collaboration between players.
ACS(I) plans to reuse the virtual campus for further online activities in the future.
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