Unit 9: AI

8-10 yrs old

11-13 yrs old

14-18 yrs old

Computer Science

Students will explore the concept of artificial intelligence or AI.

Submitted By: Minecraft Education

October 2, 2020

Lesson Plan
My Notes

Print Lesson Rework Lesson

Skills

Critical Thinking
Project Based Learning

External References

Classroom Presentation

Coding with Minecraft-9-Artificial intelligence-Presentation

Educator guide

Coding with Minecraft 9-AI-Educator guide

Student workbook

Coding with Minecraft 9-AI-Student workbook

Overview Video

AI Overview Video

Learning Objectives

CL.L2-03 Collaborate with peers, experts, and others using collaborative practices such as pair programming, working in project teams, and participating in group active learning activities.
CL.L2-04 Exhibit dispositions necessary for collaboration: providing useful feedback, integrating feedback, understanding and accepting multiple perspectives, socialization.
CL.L3A-01 Work in a team to design and develop a software artifact.
K-12 Computer Science Framework Core Concept: Control Structures.
CT.L2-12 Use abstraction to decompose a problem into sub problems.
CPP.L1:6-06 Implement problem solutions using a block-based visual programming language.
NGSS 3-5-ETS1-2 Generate and compare multiple possible solutions to a problem based on how well each is likely to meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.

Guiding Ideas

All the following lessons are approximately 45-60 minutes, depending on how much time you give students to explore the coding activities.

Lesson A: Introduction to artificial intelligence

Lesson B: Explore intelligent code

Lesson C: Code an intelligent agent

Lesson D: Code a tree hunting agent

Lesson E: Get creative with artificial intelligence

Please review the Coding With Minecraft Educator Preparation Video and Educator Guide attached for additional details.

Student Activities

In this unit, students will explore the concept of artificial intelligence or AI. The art and science of crafting programs that mimic, and even surpass human intelligence, is tremendously important. However, there are also some ethical questions, and fears when it comes to AI. You’ll explore these ideas with your students through discussion and an unplugged activity of creating AI rules for winning tic-tac-toe. The three coding activities create an intelligent agent in Minecraft, like navigating mazes and groves of trees to chop wood. Then in the final lesson, students work in pairs on an independent project to code the agent or builder to intelligently adapt to the Minecraft environment to perform an important task or solve a problem.

Performance Expectations

By the end of this unit, students will be able to:

Discuss the importance of artificial intelligence.
Identify factors that distinguish humans from machines.
Recognize that computers model intelligent behavior.
Find opportunities to code your agent to behave intelligently in Minecraft.
Design an original creative project to teach your agent to intelligently adapt to the Minecraft environment.

Please review the Assessment Guide for additional details.