Google Wave for the Language Classroom Workshop Presentation

Editor's Notes

• #3: Section head: What do we mean by “Wave”? What is it?These section headers later begin to verbify the word “wave” as has already happened among wave users/enthusiasts. Google’s choice of terminology is borrowed from a sci-fi TV series called “Firefly” in which messages communicated remotely were called “waves.”
• #4: Review three different definitions. All pretty vague explanations, but highlight what’s important: real time, collaborative communication.
• #5: What’s advantage of Wave over e-mail/IM attachments? “There's no standard or easy way to embed rich content like maps, photo slide shows, or video clips in the body of an email.”What’s advantage of Wave over cloud documents (Google Docs, wikis)? Wave isn’t for production of static, ‘finished,’ ‘flat’ document (Docs). Wave can hold slide shows, YouTube videos, interactive gadgets (maps, trip planners, mindmaps, etc.) Wave may eventually be more than just a rich-text documentAdd here: “rich convo” simplifies language/convo
• #6: Here, a switch over to a browser logged into Wave. Point out format of UI: what panel does what? Highlight parallels between webmail & e-mail software UIs. Interact with Ethnography wave.
• #7: Thisis a screenshot of Google Wave.
• #8: Highlightedisthe “Navigation” panel. This panel displaysvarious folders forviewing and andorganizingwaves.
• #9: Highlightedisthe “Contacts” panel. This panel displaysallyourcontacts and manuallyaddedbots.
• #10: Highlightedisthe Folder Contents panel. This panel displaysallthewaves in a selected folder.
• #11: Highlightedisthe Wave panel. Thisiswherethemagichappens. This panel displaysthe wave you’veselectedtoviewfromthe Folder Contents panel.
• #12: Section head: Why use Wave in the language classroom?
• #13: Open platformGoogle accessibilityinstructors & students have accounts, and many target language speakers outside of UIC have accounts, too; easier collaboration with students/instructors on a project students abroad, overseas collaborators, etc.Truly mulitlingual accepts international input method editors and has natural language processing in 40 languagesPlayback easy student contribution & accountability check maybe a snapshot of playback being used
• #14: Google Wavewas built with collaboration in mind. One could say its sole purpose is making collaborative communication easier, seamless, flexible, more fluid. Where collaboration on a task is key, Google Wave might be the best tool.
• #16: Screenshot of poor use of Wave. A wave/wavelet shouldn’t become a chain of responses as seen here. Wave isn’t be suited for purposes of a discussion board.
• #17: Section head: How and when do we Wave?
• #18: Explanation of how Google limits Wave accounts to invitation only. Eventually, gaining access will be as easy as creating any Google account and then activating the Wave portion of that account. For example, if you already use Gmail, to use Google Sites is just a couple clicks away within the Google web interface.
• #19: Give examples of each. **Think of examples of each and note them here!** Wikis – Can build wiki docs easier and more richly than most available wiki-building platforms. Itineraries – Can use gadgets to build itineraries that can be supported that wiki-like information. “Chats” – Build knowledge about a topic in target language while interviewing a native speaker in real time. Brainstorming – Can get messy, but it can also be cleaned up. Really conducive to allowing folx to contribute lots of information quickly with the support of the web. Audio/video conferences – Tied to target language chats. Note-taking – Student-built and organized course material facilitated by cumulative note-project in Wave.
• #20: Here, a switch over to a browser logged into Wave.Follow with some basic examples editing a templated wave, adding participants. Then, interacting with workshop assistant, embedding media, attaching files, using a gadget, etc.
• #21: Creating wikis can be made much easier and more collaboratively than other wiki-creating alternatives. Here we see an article written in French about French Guyana. It consists of text, hypertext, interactive Google Map, images, and videos (unseen). (Copy source: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guyane)
• #22: Creating wikis can be made much easier and more collaboratively than other wiki-creating alternatives. Here we see a little more of the article written in French about French Guyana. It consists of text, hypertext, interactive Google Map, images, and videos (unseen). (Copy source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Guyana)
• #23: Creating interactive, wiki-like itineraries are also possible. Here we see an itinerary for a three-day trip to Rome, Italy. Notice the pushpins highlighting sites of interest on the map.
• #24: Creating interactive, wiki-like itineraries are also possible. This is the same itinerary for the trip to Rome, but I’ve scrolled down the wave a little to see the wiki-like attributes of the wave. Here I’ve inserted text, hypertext, images, and video so that students can build information about the sites they “plan” to visit.
• #25: Student-side course material management (i.e., student note-taking) is much easier using Google Wave. You can see in this slide I’ve created a template to help students organize the content they contribute to the note-taking project. The structure of the wave and its “blips” reflect the structure of the class: two classes per week, each class with a lecture topic. Students as a class contribute to the wave by adding relevant information and notes to a lecture’s designated “blip” before, during, and after the lecture. (source: Google Wave ID (w%252B)6jf2bubOA, Loren Baum)
• #26: After students have added content to the wave, it should begin to look something like this. Students have contributed a Course Description, Learning Objectives and Required Texts as outlined on the first day of class. Within the blip entitled “Class 2 – Giuseppe TomasidiLampedusa e Il gattopardo,” we can see that students have added some images and links regarding the lecture in collapsible blips and have started an analysis of the novel. Just like any document to be used for reference, keeping the wave organized is the key to having compiled information that is easily accessed at a later time.
• #27: Hidden slide: this will help presenter go over basic funxions of Wave in a building-block sequence. This sequence mimics the original Wave demo available here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_UyVmITiYQWho better to copy than those who engineered the product?
• #28: Layers of Wave-Visibilelayers - wave - blip - Invisible layers - wavelet (carrierforgroupings of blips)
• #29: Translation bots, although better at translation than even a few years ago, can still be easily sniffed out.Participation is about as flat as it gets. As of now, only wave creator can set read/write or read-only rights, but and read/write participant can change anything in a wave. What’s powerful for collaboration is powerful for un-collaboration. Participants inherently assume responsibility for waves they’re a part of. Unhelpful or injurious participants can be held accountable thanks to Wave’s playback feature.As instructors you’ll need to stress the importance of organization to your students.