The Google Wave Will Change Education Forever
If you haven’t heard about Google Wave, prepare to be blown away. I made the mistake of starting this movie at 10:30 last night thinking I’d probably just watch a few minutes and drift off to sleep. Little did I know I would be glued to my screen for the next 80 mins while I took a sneak-peek into the future of how we are all going to work collaboratively across the internet. I’m happy to put myself on-record as having said that all of you who are reading this will use this product in some way, whether it is to conduct classes, arrange social events, or manage your digital footprint.
Google Wave is 100% open-source, so rest assured that developers are ravenously developing extensions, plug-ins, modules, and anything else necessary to make it work on all the platforms we use today. I implore you to watch this video; consider setting 80mins aside to digest this information, and then discuss it with us. This might be the most important professional development you do this year outside of NECC.
@scottmerrick tweeted me to let me know about the post, Five Reasons to Be Terrified of Google Wave. This post raises concerns about adopting Google Wave as your primary communications platform; while I agree with some of these concerns, I still think the Wave is going to play a crucial roll in linking all of the channels we collaborate on currently. Lars Rasmussen of Google asked the question, “What would e-mail look like if it was invented today?” Google Wave attempts to answer that, but I don’t think it is attempting to replace e-mail as suggested in that post. I absolutely spend time revising e-mails to make sure my tone and message convey exactly what I need them to, which is next-to-impossible using a platform that is real-time chatter like Google Wave. If you are “terrified” of Google Wave then you have probably already missed the boat. Don’t be scared, think critically; make the Wave work for you by letting the developers know what you need in order to be better at what you do.
9 Comments
Steven Barber
Wednesday, 3rd June 2009 at 1:07 pm
As an experienced educator, I too am excited by the possiblities that “Google Wave” perhaps presents for educators to utilize as a truly collaborative & interactive educational environment!
scottmerrick
Wednesday, 3rd June 2009 at 1:58 pm
LOL Joe, thx for the mention. I should go on record that I’ll be adopting Wave the minute I can, and that I’m not agreeing with the “Terrified” post, just that I also like to keep some “pushback” voices in the choir to keep perspective. I’m with you, having blogged Wave the minute I finished the freakin’ feature film-length demo. I’m just a lowly teacher, doin’ the best ah can, Captain.
I’m hoping this weekend to do an impromptu group viewing of the demo, within Second Life. That should be fun and enlightening, especially about the attitudes innovators take toward this stunning breakthrough!
Joe Corbett
Wednesday, 3rd June 2009 at 2:12 pm
haha Scott, sorry if it sounded like I was trying to label you as one of the “haters” of Google Wave, it was not my intention. Trust me I understand pushing back on new Technologies. I’m as cynical as they come when adopting the lastest “thing”. I never want to be that guy with a huge collection of Laser-Discs or HD-DVD’s for that matter.
It’s important to be tough on these advances because they impact our lives in so many ways and since they are open-source anything we dream up can probably be built by a talented developer. Anyway good luck on the Second Life Demo, if you want to use ISTEConnects to get the word out just let me know.
Joe Corbett
Wednesday, 3rd June 2009 at 9:57 pm
Scott Lee on the Classroom 2.0 Ning asked me this: “How will it change education? Examples?”
My response:
Well for one thing I think having many users collaborating on the same project /document at the same time in multiple languages across multiple platforms opens the door for some amazing cross cultural learning. Teaching about France? Plug Google Wave into your wiki and invite French students to work with your students in real time with translations on the fly for both groups. Sure that can be done now, but not as close to real time as this is and not with out a tremendous amount of preliminary communication. It will be easy to jump into collaborative learning sessions any where you find them.
The possibilities are endless. Google Wave is open-source which means that if you create a demand for something the Wave should do a developer can create a module to serve your needs. Which is why blogging about what you think it can do and what you need it to do is very important.
What do you think?
Boyd Blundell
Thursday, 4th June 2009 at 12:40 am
I might stream this into my Second Life class as well. Thanks for posting that, Joe.
Kate Ter Haar
Thursday, 4th June 2009 at 5:36 am
I too watched the Google Wave video and was blown away. The idea of real time collaboration is very exciting.
Andrew Marcinek
Thursday, 4th June 2009 at 11:48 am
This will change the way we communicate and educate. It basically takes all of the satellite applications we use and brings them together. Google has always found a good way of taking all the clutter out there and turn it into one, practical functioning tool. I love the playback function! Cannot wait to play!
Google wave will surely be awesome!
Joe Corbett
Thursday, 4th June 2009 at 1:14 pm
@Boyd I look forward to seeing it deployed that way, imagine interacting with your second lifers from your smart phone using wave.
@Kate It is very exciting!
@Andrew I’m really looking forward to seeing this un-cluttering my social networks, too many to manage!
Beth Still
Saturday, 6th June 2009 at 9:43 pm
Joe,
I started watching the video at 10:30 at night, too! The more I listened the more I was blown away. All I could do while I was watching the video was imagine all of the incredible possibilities that Google Wave is going to open up. It is just one more amazing tool that educators (and others of course) can use to break down barriers that separate us. It appears that it will allow us to collaborate so easily. I am very excited to give Google Wave a spin!
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