In my first post to this series of blogs I raised he question: What are we achieving with the fieldwork activities of Year 1 in the Learning Layers (LL) project?  In the two subsequent posts I gave an account on the developments in the co-design activities and in the training activities.

In this post I want to make three concluding remarks to complete the picture that may otherwise look a bit inward-looking and self-sufficient:

1) It is necessary to pay more attention to external support activities that can enrich the co-design and training activities – in particular the so-called Layers PBL projects;

2) It is necessary to have a closer look at the studies on regional innovation policies and the role of organised clusters (that are being carried out by the WP7 team).

3) It is necessary to pay attention to the potentials of and challenges for accompanying research.

1. Concerning the external support activities it is essential to note the valuable contribution that is provided by student groups working in the “Layers PBL” projects that work with particular tasks/apps proposed by LL partners. At the moment we have such projects working in several universities (HSKA, RWTH, Metropolia UAS). In the co-design activities and training activities of the year 2 we can count on the possibility to integrate their results into project work and to initiate new ones.

2. Concerning the studies on regional innovation policies and organised clusters, we have hosted several working visits of the WP7 team and attended to several sessions of stakeholder talks. We have also got several reports on other working visits of the WP7 team. This all has brought us closer to the understanding of regional and sectoral potentials and how to use ‘scaling up’ opportunies that are supported by other funding programmes. This is particularly important when we see the chance to involve other innovation regions with similar initiatives.

3. Concerning the role of accompanying research it is worthwhile to pay attention to the twofold relation of such research and the design/development activities. Firstly, the researchers have to be sufficiently closely involved in the design and development processes to sense the changes (progress or obstacles) in the process dynamics. Secondly, the researchers have to keep a relative distance to be able to document and analyse the developments (without being overly guided by their first impressions). In this respect the LL activities pose additional challenges to carry out the twofold duties of accompanying research in a balanced way.

I think this is enough on these issues at this moment. After the review of the Year 1 activities we need to get back to these issues when launching the Year 2 activities.

The discussion will be continued …

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

In my first post to this series of blogs I raised he question: What are we achieving with the fieldwork activities of Year 1 in the Learning Layers (LL) project?  In my previous posts I gave an account on the developments in the co-design activities of the LL design team Sharing Turbine (mainly taking place in Bau ABC).

In this post I will complement the picture with a similar account on training activities in the construction sector during the year 1 of LL project. Here again, I will focus mainly on training activities that have started to take shape in Bau ABC (but not exclusively on the host organisation). Concerning the development of training activities  I would formulate the following thesis:

In the training activities of the year 1 we have shifted the emphasis from ad hoc training measures towards a more comprehensive (but transparent) approach. This gives the participants a broad overview of web tools and enables quick trials. This helps them to select their own priorities and make their own plans for further learning and utilisation in their own area.

Looking back at April and May 2013, when we started the early pilots training activities, I have to admit that we were rather cautious . We had good reasons for this, since the co-design activities were only in the beginning phase and we indeed tried to avoid over-ambitious openings. Yet, we understood that we need to develop some kind of project-specific training initiatives to improve our user-skills in web and multimedia (jointly).

So, the ITB team prepared a Webinar for NNB/Agentur to support firstly the staff and later on the network members in ecological construction work. Also, some demonstration sessions with basic applications (e.g. Bosch app, Evernote) were organised with interested craft trade companies. Moreover, some agreements were reached with training providers for craft trade companies to support their training events. However, these initiatives did not raise a wide interest. We were still at the advent of linking training activities to co-design initiatives and to active utilisation of new tools.

The next step in developing training initiatives was taken in an ad hoc meeting in June 2013 (organised alongside the consortium meeting in Graz). One of the ideas put into discussion by this meeting was to organise Do-it-yourself workshops in Bau ABC to create users’ own apps. During the summer months this idea was reworked towards a Multimedia Training approach. The First Multimedia Workshop (moderated by Jenny Hughes from Pontydysgu) provided an orientation to different ways to create apps or to use services and tools in a customised and user-adapted way. This workshop had already a strong hands-on emphasis but it mainly served the purpose to outline the learning pathways forward.

The Second Multimedia Workshop in November (also moderated by Jenny Hughes) was already planned as the second in a series to be continued. This workshop consisted of several short sessions during which the participants trained with similar tasks but using somewhat different software in different groups. The programme started with easier exercises (setting up individual twitter accounts, making word clouds with wordle etc.). Then the participants prepared glogsters ands padlets to present text and multimedia content on the same page. Then cartoons, animations and videos were used to present task implementation in construction work (measurement). In the next phase several other applications were demonstrated with the help of the website of TACCLE2 project (that promotes multimedia competences of teachers and gives advice to develop their own web contents). In the final phase the participants trained with WordPress and developed their own blogs to bring together results of the previous sessions.

In the concluding session the participants (including the director of Bau ABC) committed themselves to continue with a series of such workshops. Pontydysgu volunteered to install a dedicated WordPress site for the training and provide links to relevant contents on the TACCLE2 website. In addition Pontydysgu volunteered to shape the training programme as small modules with tutorials and tasks that support self-organised learning. The participants agreed to continue independently with the proposed tools and to prepare for the next workshop their individual plans for further learning and for domain-specific use of tools.

In a flashmeeting for planning the Y2 activities this development of the training approach was given a new dimension when the participants of the meeting saw the continuation as a joint opportunity to develop wider participation. Also, the development of the WordPress site and modules was seen as a strategy for outreach to craft trade companies and for shaping customised training packages.

…

I think this is as far as I can follow the development of the training concept for construction sector. As I see it, this process has moved from smaller opening steps towards a collaborative and participative shaping of a training programme that can be scaled up in the coming years. Also, my impression is that the first steps have been paved by such ‘user engagement’ that leads to empowerment of learners and capacity building in the organisations involved.

However, this is not the whole story of the process dynamics (of “growing together”, of “hatching out” and of reaching out beyond the initial pilot contexts. Although I may have limited possibilities to report on other supporting activities, it is appropriate to bring them also into the picture by a concluding blog post.

To be continued …

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

In my previous post I raised he question: What are we achieving with the fieldwork activities of Year 1 in the Learning Layers (LL) project? I outlined an argument that we are experiencing a process dynamic in which several activities are growing together and that the engagement of our sectoral partners is growing into new dimension. Now it is time to give some evidence.

I will start with the co-design activities in the construction sector and focus on the developments in the LL design team Sharing Turbine and on the fieldwork in Bau ABC. Here I would formulate the following thesis:

In the fieldwork for Sharing Turbine the role of Bau ABC staff has changed from ‘end-users’ (who give information and test prototypes) to active participants who contribute actively to the development of prototypes.

When I look back at the reports on the co-design workshops in April and May 2013, I recognise the phase of identifying problems and mapping possible points of intervention. The overarching agenda of Sharing Turbine (digitalisation of the training and learning processes based on the White Folder) seemed like a big package that overwhelmed us. We needed more insights from the ground – from apprentices and trainers, whose work we tried to support with digital media and web tools. Therefore, the workshops were characterised by “problem-fishing” – drawing storyboards of work processes in companies and in the training centre. We started to get a picture of gaps of information/communication and situations in which use of digital media could really help. However, the parallel work of the supporting partners (outside the pilot region) with ‘use cases’ and wireframes was not directly linked to these workshops.

When I look at the reports on the co-design workshops and to working meetings in June 2013, I recognise a turning point in the process and a regrouping of actors involved in it. At that point the problem-fishing was still continued with the apprentices but the work with the staff of Bau ABC (trainers and managers) started to take a new course. Whilst we still kept the overarching agenda of the Sharing Turbine, we agreed to select a focal area for ‘rapid prototyping’. We chose the area of laying pipes and sewage (Rohrleitungsbau) and started looking more closely on the project tasks in that area (in order to develop digital support and mobile apps). For this pilot work we agreed to use the name “Rapid Turbine”. In this phase the staff of Bau ABC was actively involved in making the decision on the pilot area and selecting project tasks for design work.

When I look at the reports of the co-design workshops and working meetings from August, to November 2013 , I see a clear change in the participation of Bau ABC staff. By this time the colleagues of Pontydysgu had developed several proposals, how to insert data into the Rapid Turbine application and tentative solutions for “Help” function. Now trainers and managers were actively debating, which solutions would contribute to sustainable learning gains (and which would likely to lead to copy-paste ‘learning’  without real learning gains). These discussions were about small details, but yet there was an air about keeping the overarching learning goals (the holistic craftmanship) in the picture. In a similar way the discussion of the “Help” functions gave a differentiated picture of tools for those who are about to fail (“Don’t panic”) and of tools of those who want to deepen their understanding (“Learn more”).

—

I think I have said enough of the developments in the co-design activities. Here I have shared my impressions of the deeper level of  participation that is coming into picture. In order to get an insight into activities that are growing together, it is necessary to give a similar account on training activities of the year 1 in construction sector.

To be continued …

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

In my previous post I looked back at my blogging on the Learning Layers (LL) project during its first year of activities. I explained how the most recent weeks have been characterised by reporting and preparation for the Year 1 review. I also made the claim that our fieldwork has progressed from a transition phase (August/September) and made clear steps forward. Now it is time to have a closer look at what has happened and why I give it such an importance.

However, before we go into details, it is worthwhile to clarify on what basis I am making these comments and what status I assume them to have.

Firstly, I do not try to give an overall picture of the LL project as a whole – and not even on the work in the construction sector. During the recent months I have been mainly involved in the cooperation with Bau ABC (with focus on LL Design team Sharing Turbine and its prototype Rapid Turbine). Thus, I have not been able to follow parallel developments as thoroughly.

Secondly, my role has varied in different activities – sometimes I have been in charge of the interpretation but most often I have been the one to make notes and reports. Thus, I have had to keep an eye on the whole process and the details as well.

Thirdly, I am not trying to write these comments only from the perspective of ITB but looking at the fieldwork as our joint effort – the research & development partners, technical support partners and application partners working together.

I formulated deliberately my question as follows: “What are we achieving with our fieldwork of Year 1?” I didn’t ask: “What have we achieved …? What is the great difference ? Does it really matter, how the question is posed. To me and to us it does. The latter question draws attention to the results but leaves aside the process, how they have been achieved. The question that I have raised draws attention to the process and results as preconditions for each other. In this respect, what we see as results now, may not be the whole truth of the achievements, if the process has more potential and is only becoming mature.

Finally, I do not wish to give a list of separate achievements or indicators of improvement. Instead, I try to give a picture of (initially) separate initiatives and activities that are growing together as mutually supporting processes. Moreover, I want to give a picture of growing user engagement. Here we can give examples of the empowerment of trainers as contributors to participative processes – as dialogue partners in design sessions and as peer learners and peer tutors in training activities. And finally, what we have been seeing in the recent phases, is the growing interest to involve others once the activities are getting consolidated.

In the next blog articles of this series I will focus on the following activities and demonstrate, how they exemplify the process dynamics that I have outlined above:

 a) The developments in the work of the LL design team Sharing Turbine and in the work with the Y1 prototype Rapid Turbine (see the next blog post – Part 2);

b) The developments in the training activities – progress from singular initiatives towards a coherent and scalable training concept (see the following post – Part 3.

I stop my introductory remarks here and try to get to the two above promised blog articles without further delay.

To be continued …

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

I have just checked the reports (= podcasts) of the Pontydysgu colleagues from Online Educa Berlin 2013. This reminded me that it was about one year ago and exactly during that conference that I started my new career as blogger on the work of the ITB (Institut Technik & Bildung) team in the Learning Layers project.

Looking back, I see that I have covered different periods of the Learning Layers project and of the work of our team:

In November 2012 I wrote some blogs with which I worked myself in into the project (by looking at lessons from predecessor projects (e.g. expertAzubi and TACCLE2) and raising some common issues regarding our work with partners in construction sector.

In December 2012 I started producing reports on site visits to our application partners (Bau ABC in Rostrup and Agentur/Netzwerk Nachhaltiges Bauen in Verden) and to partner enterprises. My question was: “What do we learn from site visits?”

In January/February 2013 there were reports on the Application Partner Days. At that time most of the consortium came to site visits as well and we had series of workshops. These were followed by blogs that prepared our contributions to the Design Conference (that took place in Helsinki in March 2013). My questions were: “What have we learned from Application Partner Days?” “How do we take our lessons to the design activities?”

 In March 2013 there were reports on the results of the Helsinki Design Conference and further thoughts, how to get the local design activities organised. My question was: “How can we get the initial design ideas properly grounded?” 

In April/May/June 2013 there were less blogs but far more field activities and internal reports. The blogs written in June provided an overview of this phase in general, the workshops in Bau ABC (involving apprentices and trainers), the parallel activities with Agentur/NNB and with craft trade companies. The final blog of this phase gave insights into the stakeholder talks in the pilot region and into the explorations of our partners (CIMNE, I-Perform) on organised clusters and their roles in different European regions. My question was: “What are we learning in the current phase of our fieldwork?”

 In July 2013 there were no blogs due to summer holidays. Bau ABC was closed and most of the ITB team was on holiday as well. Yet, something was moving ahead with the pilots and with the design work.

 In August/September 2013 there was a new high season of manifold workshops. In my blogs of August I tried to put the newer developments into concept with my question: “What kind of transition phase are we going through in our fieldwork?” I discussed new developments in the design work (“Rapid Turbine prototype), in the workshops (shift of emphasis to design and training) and in stakeholder engagement (more direct dialogue on the LL project work and stakeholders priorities). Then, the flow of blogs was interrupted by a period of conference travels and the LL consortium meeting in Pafos.

 In September/October/November 2013 there has been a high season of preparing deliverables and other contributions to the Year 1 review. At the same time we have made important progress with workshops – in particular in developing the Multimedia training approach for construction sector. Sadly, there was no time to comment these steps with blogs – we were absorbed by the main duties.

Now, that we are heading towards the Year 1 review meeting in Barcelona, I find it appropriate to have a closer look at the recent progress in our fieldwork and how it is reflected in different activities.

To be continued …

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

This is just a short note “in eigener Sache” (in my own interest).

Some time has passed since my latest blogs and much has happened in the meantime. However, I have missed part of it due to a short holiday break. Then, I have been travelling a couple of weeks on missions. Unfortunately writing blogs during my travels is not one of my strengths. So, I need to get my feet on the ground to catch up or to wrap up.

Here is a short ToDo list for blogs to be written and themes to be covered:

1) The fieldwork in the Learning Layers project in the construction sector has taken several steps further. This needs to be reported.

2) The sessions that focused on the Learning Layers project at the European Conference on Educational Research (ECER’13 in Istanbul) were successful. Also, there were other interesting sessions that triggered follow-up measures in terms of knowledge sharing (and practice sharing).

3) The consortium meeting of the Learning Layers (still going on in Paphos, Cyprus) has pushed us some steps forward and gives us insights into the results and achievements of the first years. This needs to be discussed.

So, although I am on the road, I know that I need to get back to writing pretty soon …

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

In the previous postings to this series of blogs I have characterised the transition phase that we (ITB, Pontydysgu and Bau ABC) are going through with our fieldwork for the Learning Layers (LL) project.  I have firstly given a general overview (part 1), then looked at the particpative workshops (part 2) and then at the ongoing design work and planning of training concepts (part 3). In this final article I put into discussion some thoughts on the role of accompanying research (Begleitforschung) in such a transition phase.

As I see it, the tasks taken up in the Rapid Turbine initiative give rise to a complex research agenda, in which pedagogic challenges and socio-technical design processes become interlinked with each other. In this context research work and development work are interacting with each other as mutually complementing contributions to a participative development co-process with the users – firstly with trainers and  apprentices. Later on the process will also involve  also skilled workers and  company representatives from construction sector as well as vocational school teachers.

Instead of seeing the R&D processes as linear and expert-driven processes in which the users are seen as informants (in the beginning) and as testers of prototypes and pre-final solutions (at the end), the Rapid Turbine is being shaped on a participative and iterative process. In such a process the design workshops and learning events serve that purpose of raising the users’ awareness on possible solutions and their own capacity to contribute. At the same time the researchers have the opportunity to analyse, how the growing awareness of emerging solutions makes it possible for the users to change their own working and learning culture. Parallel to this the designers get new insights into key issues concerning the acceptability and possible benefits of the proposed solutions.

Below some key questions are formulated for such R&D dialogue, in which researchers, developers and users are challenged to find the turning points that help to overcome obstacles and to make the proposed solutions work in practice:

1. How can potential users’ attitudes to mobile technologies, web tools and apps/services be changed in the course of pilot activities. Is it possible to overcome general rejection or mere leisure-time oriented consumerism and stimulate creative use to support working and learning?
2. How can the use of such technologies, tools and apps/services help to bring the real working life closer to the learning situations in training centre? How can impulses and innovations be shared in such a way that they enrich working and learning culture?
3. How can wider access to information and learning resources be linked to better understanding on the uses and quality of information? How can use of internet and new media help the users to assess their own learning and professional growth (what they can do and what they can’)?
4. How can improved access to information and communication resources and media from different locations be utilised to make communication and knowledge sharing across the organisation more effective (as support for working and learning)?
5. How can improved possibilities to record and analyse learning experiences at work to support professional development of individuals and knowledge sharing in organisations?

As has been indicated above, such questions cannot be answered a priori on the basis of purely observational research. Instead, the answers have to be found in the context of the participative process – with reference to trials and errors in different phases. Therefore, the research work has to be carried out as accompanying research that takes into account the open options, intervening factors and the actors’ choices in the pilot activities.

So, the researchers have to work  in the participative process and have an insight into changing circumstances, different interests, optional choices and new technical possibilities that come into picture during the work. This is what accompanying research has to conceptualise and analyse in such processes while working together with the developers and users.

And the story goes on …

PS. This posting (as the other three of the same series) has focused mainly on the cooperation of ITB, Pontydygu and Bau ABC with focus on the Rapid Turbine initiative. At the same time other members of ITB team have been working with other technical partners and the application partner NNB/Agentur with focus on the design idea Captus for the ecological construction work. As I have not been involved in the recent events, I have not been able to cover these developments.

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

In the first  post of this series of blogs I indicated that we (the ITB team together with our Pontydysgu colleagues and the application partner Bau ABC)  are going through a transitional phase in our fieldwork for the Learning Layers  (LL) project. In the second post I looked back at the shifts of emphasis that had characterised our field visits and workshops in Bau ABC since the first ones in winter to the latest ones before and after the summer holiday break. In both postings I made the point that we had moved from preparatory measures to work in the context of a participative design process. In this posting it is time to consider the implications of such process for the design activities themselves and for the necessary training activities to be planned and carried out.

In principle, there has been an implicit agreement among the LL partner that our project is not a “technology push” project. Neither have we seen our application partners as clients in the supermarket – making choices between ready-made solutions that are on the shelf. Instead, the emphasis has been put on participative co-design processes. Yet, it has been quite a challenge to get such processes take off in the domains and in the locations where we want to carry out pilot activities.

In the case of the Rapid Turbine initiative Graham Attwell has given some insights into the first steps of the design work, into the plans to produce videos (the helmet camera) and into conceptual challenges (“closing the gap”). Much of this design work is still on the way and the demonstrators are yet to come. However, we already know that much of the messages of trainers and apprentices have been taken on board. The important thing is that the Pontydysgu colleagues try to provide real support for completing working and learning tasks without dropping the idea of self-organised learning. Thus, the web tools and the software solutions are there to enhance the learners’ awareness of their own learning. At the end of the exercise, the apprentices should have a picture what they can do, what the cannot do yet and what challenges they can meet in the next phase. This is being discussed between developers, trainers and us, the accompanying researchers.

This has also implications for getting the forthcoming Rapid Turbine designs work together with existing applications and software solutions (such as the Reflect application for the LL project and the software for the assessment procedures in Bau ABC). In this way the support for project-based learning of apprentices would be linked to a tool that enables audio recording of learners’ reports and trainers’ feedback – and to the assessment processes. This, as we understand, will take some time and requires further efforts in the design process.

Parallel to this we have made progress in our discussions, how to give shape for training activities that would support the Rapid Turbine initiative and enhance the general media literacy of trainers and apprentices. Whilst the design work and the discussion on appropriate workshops were firstly taking off as two different things, they seem to be getting closer to each other. It is obvious that the design of the Rapid Turbine gives rise to specific training activities. These can be seen as one part of a wider range of training options to be considered together with the application partners. Here, we are pleased to be able to share experiences with the EU-funded TACCLE projects that have a long experiences with such workshops for teachers to help them produce user-generated web content.

Here I need to stress that both the design work for Rapid Turbine and the development of the training concepts are at an early stage. Yet, we are carrying out this work via joint working meetings in which different parties are actively engaged. This, to me, is already aq good sign and I am looking for the next steps that are taken very soon.

To be continued …

PS. I have written this blog posting just before a series of working meetings with several LL partners and stakeholders that will bring these issues (and wider issues) further. As I will not be present in all these activities and since I will be travelling some time afterwards, it may take some time before we get updates. PK

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

In my introductory statement to this series of blog postings I indicated that we – the ITB team together with our colleagues in Pontydysgu and our are application partner Bau ABC) are  going through a transition phase in our fieldwork. Roughly, this transition can be characterised as a  shift from preparatory measures to active collaboration in participative co-design work. This might seem a bit bold statement but I think this is exactly what we are experiencing at the moment.

Looking back at our workshop reports and my early blog postings on the Learning Layers (LL) project, I see that we were  mapping the grounds for forthcoming pilot activities. During the winter months (before the Design Conference) and the Easter break we had collected quite a lot of interview materials and made several field visits. In this phase we were getting insights into the work of individual company representatives and full-time trainers of Bau ABC. This material was used for the initial User Stories for the Application Partner Days and for the Design Conference of the . In Bremen we tried to group this material into contextual maps – to identify emerging  design ideas. (Later on some of the ITB colleagues have produced summaries of the interviews and coded it with MAXQDA.)

After the Design Conference in March our key question was, how to get the initial design ideas well grounded in the working and learning contexts of our application partners. We felt the need to get a better and wider understanding on the working and learning contexts of apprentices (both at their companies and at the training centre Bau ABC). We also wanted to get a better picture how they were using mobile devices and web technologies – in particular as support for working and learning. For this purpose we firstly organised a conversational workshop and then some storyboard workshops. With the help of these workshops we got more holistic pictures of the working days of apprentices in companies and in Bau ABC. Furthermore, we got a glimpse of some trade-specific problem situations or challenges and ideas, what role mobile technologies, web tools and software solutions may play. Also, some ideas were raised for context-specific apps.

With the trainers of Bau ABC we also had a storyboard exercise to illustrate their working day alongside apprentices’ projects. Then, during later working visits  we have continued to review the results of apprentices’ workshops but on top of that we have had further discussion on the points of intervention for the first year pilot activities. With these discussions we have got more comprehensive picture of needs to facilitate training and learning processes (with the help of digital media and web) and of the limits of current software solutions and web applications. Moreover, in these sessions the colleagues from Bau ABC have increasingly worked as a local LL team with regular cooperation with researchers from ITB and developers from Pontydysgu. (In this context we have also identified some spin-off initiatives for which we need to find additional resources.)

In this way we are reaching thew phase in which the workshops need to include demonstrations of emerging tools, applications and web designs. Then, the workshops could give focused feedback of the usability or shortcomings of the tentative solutions and/or the possibilities to use complementary apps and solutions. This has further implications for the development process, for supporting training activities and for our research agenda.

To be continued …

PS. With this series of blog postings I am focusing more closely on our cooperation with Bau ABC in the context of the Rapid Turbine initiative. This doesn’t imply that our work with our other application partners would have gone quiet. On the contrary – quite a lot of steps forward have been taken by in the fieldwork and design processes of the Captus team that focuses on the ecological construction work (represented by NNB/Agentur in Verden). However, since I have not been present in these events, I am not in the position to give detailed reports. PK

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.

Quite some time has passed since my latest blog postings on the Learning Layers (LL)  project. This doesn’t mean that the project would have gone quiet or that there would not have been anything interesting going on in the fieldwork. On the contrary – there were a lot of activities going on before the holiday break and the same has been the case after the holiday break. Thus, we (from the ITB team) have had to put a lot of effort to get the events and the activities and events documented with internal notes and reports. At the same time our Pontydysgu colleagues have been busy with development work and with documenting their work processes. (See the recent blog postings on Rapid Turbine and Reflect by Graham Attwell and his colleagues on the Wales-Wide-Web.)

Looking back at the my earlier postings from May and June I see a gradual transition in the way that we have worked. In our workshops and joint meetings with apprentices, company representatives and trainers we were looking for possibilities to launch participative design processes. We were working with storyboards and user journeys, getting insights into critical situations or everyday life innovations in which use of digital media and web can play a role. In the interviews, working meetings and reflection sessions we got feedback on the uses of web tools and applications by professionals in construction sector.  This all has been very valuable for getting a better understanding, how to get participative co-design processes working. (And we are not necessarily saturated with such material yet.)

However, from a certain point on our work started to have other characteristics. The collaboration of ITB, Pontydysgu and Bau ABC started to focus more closely on using digital media and web resources in selected working and learning projects. This was the step forward from the overarching design idea “Sharing Turbine”  – digitalisation of the White Folder (see the earlier blog of Graham) and the related training/learning processes. Whilst this overarching perspective needs to be kept on the agenda, it was necessary to start more focused pilot activities on the ground. For this purpose a particular area of construction work was chosen, – building pipelines for water supply and sewage (Rohrleitungsbau). This initiative was named “Rapid Turbine” to emphasise that it is a quicker pioneering exercise within the larger agenda.

With the following blog postings I try to give some insights into our recent fieldwork activities during the period that we have been working with the Rapid Turbine initiative and with complementary activities. My own impression is that we have been going through a transition from preparatory measures towards a real participative co-design process. Indications of such transition can be seen in our workshops with apprentices and trainers, in the design work itself and in related preparation of training models and in the rethinking of our research agendas in the LL project.

I think this is enough for an opening statement. There are a lot of issues to take up in the forthcoming postings.

To be continued …

Acknowledgements. This work is supported by the European Commission under the FP7 project LAYERS (no. 318209), http://www.learning-layers.eu.