Theory Camp(s) in the LL project – What for?

The need for specific measures to reflect on the theoretical foundations was raised by the reviewers comments in the Y1 review meeting in Barcelona. In particular these comments pointed to the theoretical assumptions regarding the Social Semantic Server and its use in the project. In general, the project was challenged to specify its own position vis-à-vis different (and sometimes contradictory) references that have been quoted. Also, other issues were raised – e.g. the project was asked need to clarify its commitment to ‘action research’ and to specify its position vis-à-vis newer developments in that field – notably the emergence of ‘transdisciplinary action research’ in cross-over areas between community psychology and landscape architecture (with an emphasis on societal dialogue and validation between planning and community participation).

One idea of the LL consortium was to respond to this critique with so called theory camp activities. At first this idea was discussed in one of the workshops of the consortium meeting in Innsbruck that started preparing a “theory camp” type of workshop for the Aachen meeting. After the Innsbruck meeting this idea has triggered further (complementary) initiatives that suggest a wider use of ‘theory camps’ with different accents, partly contributing to the Aachen meeting and partly continuing after it. This document tries to clarify, how these initiatives can complement each other and how we all can benefit of both.

The central initiative of the Innsbruck meeting: A Wiki for Theory camp in Aachen

The working group in the Innsbruck started to map different contemporary theories (or theoretical concepts) on learning – mainly with focus on generic theories and with an interest to map the theoretical landscape. One focus of this effort was to make transparent which theoretical assumptions are represented in the consortium and especially to clarify theoretical assumptions of the Social Semantic Server and their compatibility with the conceptual foundations of other project activities. This has been followed up mainly in the preparation of the Aachen agenda with a specific Wiki page that outlines issues and a procedure. (See the Wiki http://htk.tlu.ee/layers/MW/index.php/Aachen_Theory_Camp .)

The local initiative of the ITB team: A gDrive folder for a wider range of themes

A second focus (already in Innsbruck) was the need to discuss a broader pedagogical concepts and common research approaches to the project. As first follow-up measure to this, Joanna Burchert wrote a short input paper. It aimed to point out basic assumptions on learning (basic for the theories collected and discussed in Innsbruck by the LL consortium) and to show up their consequences for evaluation, cooperation and tool development. Further texts with pedagogical focus, e.g. exploring the terms formal and informal learning, followed. They are integrated in the gDrive “Theory Camp preparation” folder https://drive.google.com/?authuser=0#folders/0B02cXf0hbQH0ZFg1eVlUM28zZ0U.

In the forthcoming posts I will give some insights into themes prepared by the ITB team and discuss, how we can bring these into discussion in Aachen.

More posts to come …

Below I will post a shortened version of the report on the LL Consortium meeting in Innsbruck that I wrote immediately after the meeting.

This meeting was planned as a preparatory event that prepares the grounds for the Integration Meeting in Aachen (March 2014). The assumption of the coordinator was that the main activities in the two sectors will take shape as Development Projects – including some overarching or overlapping Integration Measures or Co-design and Evaluation measures. Thus, the role of technical work packages could be discussed as support to be offered for these activities.

1. Work with the sustainability scenarios & responding to the reviewers’ concerns

The sessions were opened with the overview presentation of Tobias Ley that emphasised the work with sustainability sessions and taking on board the remarks on the reviewers:

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B7vXuqBBjr9PendGTWh0YmJtRUU

The general idea of working with the sustainability scenarios was made transparent by the presentation of Gilbert Peffer and Tor-Arne Bellika, exemplified with the forthcoming cooperation with Norwegian and Estonian managed clusters (see the case ppt and the Wrap-up ppt in the folder). Tamsin Treasure-Jones and John Bibby presented a further developed version of the sustainability scenario in the healthcare sector:

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B48qJr53GUxMU2NnNzZXT1ZkM0E

Ludger Deitmer and Pekka Kämäräinen based their presentation on the draft scenario outlined in the Barcelona review meeting and updated the picture with an insight into the key activities (Piloting, Multimedia training, Platform development) and how they are being scaled up with the support of spin-out projects. In our presentation we drew attention to the urgent uncertainty factors that need to be resolved.

2. Work in sectoral groups with focus on their Development Projects (DPs)

After these inputs there was a quick overview on the Development Projects.  Before the Innsbruck meeting the partners in the Captus team had provided a timeline for mapping the schedules of different DPs and support activities that contribute to the work under the joint agenda. This was used as a basis for the whole discussion in the construction sector group.

We outlined the uncertainties in working further with the Sharing Turbine agenda (in particular the lack of continuing technical support for programming). Since the piloting with Learning Toolbox is linked to the supporting multimedia training and to the development of platform for learning and knowledge we found it difficult to draw a timeline before having the question of support solved. Taken the above mentioned uncertainty into account we came up with a tentative timeline.

3. Work in mixed groups with focus on (technical) supporting activities

The other group work sessions were paved py shorter and longer presentations on the following topics:

a) Common data modelling of Design themes/Development projects by using Conceptual maps (Cmap)

presented by Vladimir Tomberg, see https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B-zb4vasFuiuRGVPbXVIMkhoZWc.

b) The offerings of WP6 to support Design teams/ Development projects with infrastructure and tools presented by Ralf Klamma; see https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Byec3A-kUd0wX1NUTG8tQ1VybnM and

c) Revisiting the earlier presentations on the Social semantic server with additional flavour from Owen Gray’s document “Social Semantic Server for Dummies”, see https://docs.google.com/document/d/1D4S6yAx3IFPIE4paQnoynJyc-_JLPOMoImC2M4w9HOM

4. The initiative to work with an LL Theory Camp starts to take shape

Whilst many of these sessions were used for internal knowledge sharing between partners who had not been strongly involved in each others’ work packages, one of the working groups took step forward in preparing the grounds for a common “theory camp” activity. This was triggered by the critical remarks of some of the reviewers (in Barcelona review meeting) with recommendation to review the theoretical assumptions underpinning certain work packages and to clarify the position of the LL project vis-à-vis the theories and conceptions that are used. The said working group started to develop posters to group theories and concepts for such examination, see https://drive.google.com/#folders/0B7vXuqBBjr9PZVQ2d0d3SlRYZlk.

5. Issues arising from further group work sessions

Without going into detailed reporting on further sessions it is possible to summarise their importance for the work of ITB and Pont teams with the following checklist that was taken up in the follow-up meeting on 13.2.:

– Further development of sustainability scenarios in the construction sector;

– Immediate measures to ensure technical support for SharingTurbine and Learning Toolbox;

– Synchronisation of the empirical studies for WP1 (key actor interviews) with other ongoing activities;

– Launching the ITB-Pont preparatory measures for the above mentioned“theory camp” and related work with conceptual maps;

– “Technical camp” for developers that are interested in enhancing the use of  WordPress and to develop plugins that integrate WP to SSS.

– Joining the initiative group on Augmented Reality in the construction work that had a kickstart in one of the working groups and started a vivid e-mail discussion.

– Updating the Open Design Library with presentations of construction sector DPs and updating the respective LL Wiki pages.

Altogether, we took a lot of homework from the Innsbruck meeting.

More posts to come …

The last event of the Learning Layers (LL) project  in the year 2013 of which I blogged was the Y1 Review meeting in Barcelona. One of the measures with which we have responded to the feedback of reviewers has been the shift of emphasis from overarching Design Ideas to more specific Development Projects. This shift of emphasis was already discussed during the Y1 Review meeting, but it really took off during the preparation of the LL consortium meeting in Innsbruck (that took place in February).

What has this shift of emphasis meant to us:

Firstly, it has provided us an opportunity consider, to what extent the co-design processes are going on with an overarching agenda (of the original Design Teams set up in March 2013) or whether they have moved to more differentiated processes.

Secondly, it has provided us an opportunity to give shape for sub-initiatives or complementary initiatives that may play a role in different contexts.

Thirdly, it has provided us an opportunity to reconsider, in what ways we share experiences and knowledge on co-design activities.

Here it is not necessary to give a comprehensive account on call changes or to go into very specific details. Yet, I can give some examples of the changes that have occurred with reference to the above mentioned reorientations:

1) In the Design Team “Sharing Turbine” the original idea was the digitisation of the White Folder (learning and working resource of the apprentices in Bau ABC). In the current phase the work has differentiated to several parallel Development Project:

1a) The Development Project “Learning Toolbox” is developing a toolbox of mobile apps and resources that supports the work with the White Folder (and paves the way for digitisation of documents and reports).

1b) The Development Project “Multimedia/ Web 2.0  Training “ is giving shape for the training activities that have been piloted with the staff of Bau ABC (and are to be supported by online learning).

1c) The Development Project “Baubildung.net” is developing a platform for professional networking platform for construction sector. This platform will also provide the basis for online learning in the context of the above mentioned training activities.

2) The Development Project “Reflect app” (that was initially developed with support of an affiliated students’ project) is being developed further by the LL project. The audio-based app that helps the users to record their learning experiences and learning gains (and convert them into documents) will be piloted both in healthcare and in construction sector.

3) The flashmeetings of Design Teams have to some extent given way for more comprehensive design forums of the two sectors healthcare and construction sector.

As we are talking of recent changes in dynamic processes, it is not yet the time to conclude, to what extent the Development Projects have shaped the daily work of the LL project. Yet, we can already see that the picture of the LL project is getting more networked and more colourful.

More posts to come …

Last year I managed to blog almost regularly on our progress with the Learning Layers (LL) project. To my own disappointment I have to admit that I have not been able to continue that tradition this year. Now – before the end of March – it is high time to break the silence and to catch up with the activities of the LL project.

Before I go to the ongoing activities (in my next blog posts) I need to make some explanatory remarks.

Firstly, this has not been a quiet period in the LL project. On the contrary, we have had a lot of activities. Even more, we have had to struggle with deadlines to be met with different kinds of contributions. That has pushed the good habit of blogging out of the way.

Secondly, we have done quite a lot of internal development work inside the project. For that we have also needed internal discussions to reach common conclusions. That has also delayed blogging of the results.

Thirdly, we are reaching an integrative phase in which we need to get several initiatives and prototypes linked to each other. This also requires its own time and privacy. Therefore, there has been no case to rush to blogging.

Fourthly, we are entering also a phase that is characterised by joint self-reflection regarding our theoretical foundations, methodological commitments and on their implications for our fieldwork. Here, we also need space and time for mutual adjustment. This has also delayed blogging (although blogs can facilitate dialogue and mutual awareness).

In addition to the points above there have been practical issues that need not be discussed here in detail. After having said all this, I have come to the conclusion that I should not give up the good habit of blogging on our progress. So, in the coming posts I will try to catch up and pave the way for ongoing reporting.

More posts to come …

(Editorial remark 21.11.2016:) This post documents a transformation of perspective in the Learning Layers co-design work in Bau-ABC: the transition from the initial design idea ‘Sharing Turbine’ (digitisation of the Bau-ABC White Folder) into the new framework concept ‘Learning Toolbox (LTB)’. This text was not originally published as a blog post but only as an internal workshop report on a working meeting of Bau-ABC trainers and research partners from ITB (Pekka Kämäräinen) and Pontydysgu (Owen Gray). Since this is the earliest document in which the shift of the initial design idea to the new one has been described, it has been retrospectively included into the Working & Learning blogs, category ‘LTB-blogs. From this point on we have the original text of the workshop report:

“Situation assessment/ Sharing Turbine: In this context Pekka and Owen indicated that the original idea for comprehensive digitisation of the projects of the White Folder had to be given up. Firstly, it pointed out to be very time-consuming for the programming work and there was a lack of support for coding that could not be resolved in due time. Secondly, it pointed out that in many tasks typing with mobile devices would also take more time than writing on paper. Therefore, the emphasis was shifted from a full-scale digitisation of the work with White Folder to the development of a supporting mobile toolbox that facilitates the completion of the training projects and learning at workplace.

Demonstration of the new wireframes for the mobile app for Learning Toolbox

Owen presented the new wireframes that had been designed with Prototyper software and outlined the following areas: “Information”, “Create”, “Tools and Materials”, … “Don’t panic”, “Settings”.

We had a discussion on the functionality of each areas and how it supports knowledge processes in the training projects and in real work situations. In all these contexts it was made clear that the app is to be used locally by each user and that they have to decide themselves, what to share and what to export elsewhere.

In the discussion several points were raised to ensure that the pictures, audios and videos could be “signed” as original contributions of the persons presenting them (or as appropriate quotes with credit to the original source). Also, the use of QR tags was proposed to link contributions of apprentices to the course/project they are completing. In addition, it became clear that the written project report (with downloaded digitised contents) can be scanned and stored as set of digitised contents). With some areas there was a closer discussion, how to meet the needs of a training project (support for learning) and how to meet the needs of work situation (facilitation of problem-solving and decision-making). Altogether, the wireframes were greeted and the participants were looking forward to the next iteration. (In the meantime Owen will visit TU Graz to discuss closer cooperation in the design process.)”

– – –

This is the part of the Workshop report that deals with the transition from the old design idea to the new framework. Not much has been written down on the discussion in Bau-ABC. The wireframes (not available as they were presented at that point) were already convincing enough to demonstrate that the new framework builds upon the earlier discussions in our joint co-design sessions. We had now found the focus for software development. I think this is enough of the start of the work with ‘Learning Toolbox’.

More blogs will follow …

The posts of this series are about the Year One (Y1) Review Meeting of the Learning Layers (LL) project that took place last week. In the first two posts  I discussed the event as such and our inputs (as team presentations). In the final one I will discuss the feedback that was given and how we respond to it.

I am aware of the fact that the reviewers need still some time to finalise their comments. Therefore, it would not be appropriate to try to give a comprehensive summary (before the review panel has completed its own work). However, already at this stage it is possible to pick up some messages that are not controversial and pieces of advice that can be taken on board without further delay.

Below I present some comments of the reviewers that focus on the research, design and development activities.

1. Coherent approach to theories, designs and prototypes: The reviewers appreciated the knowledge of relevant theories on technology enhanced learning, workplace learning and learning in informal contexts. Yet, some of the reviewers drew attention to the fact that the designs and prototypes are based on specific assumptions on learning. The project was challenged to discuss these underlying assumptions and consider the compatibility between the conceptual orientations and the designs.

2. Commitment to action research in an explicit and reflected way:  The reviewers noted that the project has made in several deliverables commitments to action research. Yet, the relations to different traditions of action research have not been discussed thoroughly and the methodological implications are not clear. The project was challenged to organise a workshop to make the relations to different traditions and its own methodological commitments more explicit. (Here, attention was drawn to transdisciplinary action research as a strong emerging approach.)

3. Balance and coherence between different activities: The project had demonstrated a wide range of activities. This was appreciated but at the same time the reviewers pointed to the risk that the activities remain parcelled and disintegrated. In particular they emphasised that research data should not be collected for the sake of showing data. The project was challenged to demonstrate, how the collection and analysing of data supports the design and development activities.

4. Documentation of co-design and stakeholder engagement activities: The project had demonstrated a great number of events with sectoral stakeholders and their organisations. Yet, the role of such activities and the progress with the counterparts had not been clearly reflected in the deliverables. It seemed that the dynamics of the activities had been lost in the logic of reporting on the basis of work packages. The project was challenged to document the processes and the results more explicitly (not only in terms records and minutes of meetings).

At this moment I can raise some points for discussion, how the project can respond to these comments:

ad 1) Coherent approach to theories, designs and prototypes: This is clearly an issue for the whole consortium and needs a proper conversation in a near future.

ad 2) Commitment to action research in an explicit and reflected way: This comment meets our own self-assessment. In the joint meetings of the ITB and Pontydysgu teams we had already agreed to organise a joint workshop to promote dialogue between (classical) action research, accompanying research (DE), interactive research (NL) and design research (WP2).

ad 3) Balance and coherence between different activities: This comment also meets the situation assessment of several partners. Already during the review meeting we started a discussion, how to arrange the collection of research data in a more synergy-promoting and coordinated way. We also took note that the different dynamics of design activities in the two pilot regions should be taken into account in the scheduling of data collection.

ad 4) Documentation of co-design and stakeholder engagement activities: This comment draws attention to the risk of paying too little attention to the process documentation when prioritising research results or progress in design and development activities. This meets the situation assessment of the sectoral partners and the coordinators of sectoral activities. In many respects this issue is connected with the need to clarify the commitment to action research.

I think this is enough at the moment. We will discuss the feedback and our responses in greater detail when we have the report of the reviewers.

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.

The posts of this series are about the Year One (Y1) Review Meeting of the Learning Layers (LL) project that took place last week. In the first post to this series of blogs I discussed the event as such. In this post I will focus on our inputs and how we presented then. In the next ones I will discuss the feedback that was given and how to respond to it.

I do not try to give a comprehensive overview on all presentations that were given by the project consortium. Instead, I will focus on the following ones:

1. The presentation of the North-German partners on the Construction pilot region [05] and
2. The presentations of the Work Package 7 team [13-18] on stakeholder engagement, open innovation and scaling up.

ad 1) The presentation on the North-German Construction pilot region [05]

In our presentation we provided firstly insights into the pilot region, partner organisations and domain-specific issues to be considered (building and construction work as mobile work with high risk of occupational hazards and specific emphasis on process innovation). We then moved to the challenges for sectoral R&D work, research methodologies used (including the ‘rapid ethnography) and the role of interviews, user stories and personas). We then moved to the overview on the design process, the role of different workshops and the progress in two design teams (Captus and Sharing Turbine) and then via interim results to tensions and and possible measures. At the end we outlined a picture of Y2 activities based on the key role of two major pilot activities, the support from empirical research and stakeholder engagement as well as further support from joint training activities and affiliated projects (e.g. the Layers PBL projects).

This presentation is available in the shared Google Drive, please click the link here.

In this context it is worthwhile to emphasise that both the finalisation of the slides and the presentation itself were chaacterised by intensive teamwork. This was not just a matter of few researchers putting the slides together and sharing the task to present with others. The final version was reworked during the rehearsal and the application partners (from Bau ABC and Agentur) played their roles as presenters very prominently. In this way we managed to perform as a team that played the ball to each other (Melanie Campbell, Ludger Deitmer, Stefan Thalmann, Pekka Kämäräinen, Melanie Campbell, Tobias Funke and Pekka Kämäräinen). Thus, we gave a joint presentation on our common experiences in a process that we have been planning, implementing and shaping together.

ad 2) The presentations of the Work Package 7 team [13-18] on stakeholder engagement, open innovation and scaling up

The contribution of the Work Package 7 team was a complex set of presentations that moved a coherent story forward (with different sets of presenters/panelists that gave short inputs):

• Scaling up – A Strategy and its Implementation – the core of the story (Graham Attwell and Gilbert Peffer)
• Creating results through open innovation – including the affiliated pilots (Graham Attwell, Patricia Santos, Merja Bauters, Ralf Klamma and Gilbert Peffer)
• Engaging stakeholders and building capacity for adoption and impact – providing insights into networks and scaling up measures in the pilot regions (Graham Attwell, John Bibby, Paul Carder, Melanie Campbell, Ludger Deitmer and Gilbert Peffer).
• Working towards sustainability – providing scenarios of sustainability based on support from different stakeholder communities (Tor-Arne Bellika, Gilbert Peffer, Melanie Campbell, John Bibby, Ralf Klamma and Graham Attwell).
• Wrapping up – with Roadmap for Y2 (Graham Attwell).

This presentation is also available in the shared Google Drive, please click here.

This latter presentation was even more strongly characterised by teamworking to give a coherent message of research, design and development work that relies very strongly on the involvement of sectoral partners and committed researchers/ technical support.

It is worthwhile to have a closer look at the message that was presented. It was also appreciated in the meeting.

To be continued …

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

Last week the Learning Layers (LL) project had the Year One (Y1) Review Meeting in Barcelona. In the first post to this series of blogs I want to take a look at the event as such. In the following ones I will discuss our inputs, the feedback that was given and how to respond to it.

The panel of reviewers had already examined the Deliverables of the Y1. Now the face-to-face meeting provided an opportunity for the consortium to set accents and to give live impressions on the work. For the reviewers this meeting provided the possibility to ask questions and give direct comments on specific issues. Altogether, the review is completed with a written report. Thus, we should wait for the report before we make very specific conclusions. Yet, it is appropriate to make some preliminary remarks on the event, on our contributions and on the dialogue that took place in Barcelona.

Firstly, it is worthwhile to consider the event as a learning opportunity for the project consortium. We had agreed to work with a common storyline – instead of presenting the work packages in a compartmentalised way. Therefore, we needed the two days’ rehearsal to link the contributions from work packages, pilot regions and design teams to each other. It really helped us to get an idea, how our presentations can refer to each other and how we can get the messages stronger.

Secondly, since the presentations had been rehearsed, we were in a better position to listen to the feedback, respond to questions and take the comments on board. Also, we were in a better position to start our on reflection, how to adjust our activities on the basis of useful advice from the reviewers.

I think this is enough of the event itself. Now it is time to look back, what we presented and what kind of comments were given.

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 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.