Moving the PK-12 enterprise to digital contexts during the COVID-19 crisis has accentuated local school systems’ incapacities to develop and deliver high quality instruction to students with extensive learning and communication needs, including students with autism and students with significant intellectual (dis) abilities.

We propose building a learning community that operates on the principle that the best and most engaging learning is through play. We intend to create a space for peer play and learning that captures the power of collaboration between learners of all abilities as they seek to create their own play space using imagination, analysis, communication, and problem solving skills.

Schooling experiences are critical for maintaining language, increasing communication, and engaging in learning skills and knowledge. We see inclusive, peer-to-peer gaming as a potent opportunity to help reverse the situation that ability-based classroom segregation has started and distance learning has worsened, particularly for students with extensive support needs. We propose building a new learning community that operates on the principle that the best and most engaging learning is through play.

Minecraft is an online game environment that has limitless possibilities for same-age peers to engage in digital learning through communities of practice. Autcraft, an online community for children with autism that lives in Minecraft, offers an example of what we intend to create: a space for peer play and learning that captures the power of collaboration between learners of all abilities as they seek to create their own play space using imagination, analysis, communication, and problem solving skills.

For students with the most significant needs, moving from physical to digital realities may be complex and take time. Thus, we want to work from the Autcraft example to develop a scalable learning space to support inclusive digital learning.