Google Wave!

So with all of the talk about Google Wave, I am very excited to report that I was just invited by Google to join the beta version! I logged in, but now I'm not so sure what to do with it. I know that it allows users to incorporate text, photo, video, and more, all into communications in real time.

In some ways I see this as an online tool that may be able to expand upon the discussion capabilities of the wiki. The discussion aspect of the wiki is kind of limited in terms of the types of media one is able to embed and the sophistication allowed in doing so. What would make this usable in the classroom is if everyone had a gmail account in order to utilize all of google's capabilities.

One other area of Google's that I think is useful is Google News. An idea that literally popped into my head this minute is how it can be used for students to follow current events topics. As I've mentioned, on my wiki, I have students following current events "hotspots." Google News allows users to customize their pages to show them news on specific topics. This would be pretty convenient for students to decide exactly how their news is aggregated as they follow a specific topic. I think I'll share this with them tomorrow...

From what it sounds like, Google is going to keep people's attention, and more of their tools are going to be used by teachers. I am looking forward to see what is next...