While we recognise the importance of visiting and practising skills in actual classroom, video provides a convenient substitute. Real classrooms can be shown in a form that allows for repetition and reflection. In a sense, examples of good teaching can be isolated and studied from a variety of perspectives, free from the time constraints of live observation. Video is a powerful medium for simulating experience and STF has been designed to capitalise upon this. Human learning is embedded within social contexts hence instruction should emphasise the social dimension.
Dialogue is a major medium for providing experience in the knowledge construction process.
While the individual learner is the only one who can construct his or her unique understanding of the world, this understanding emerges in a social context. It is only when we share knowledge, that its constructedness becomes apparent. Cooperative learning situations encourage positive dialogue by making cooperative skills explicit so that students practise observing, providing appropriate feedback and reflection during conversations. Collaborative learning fosters discussions that allow different points of view, a clash of minds, exchange of ideas, which all contribute to the development of creative thinking and deeper levels of understanding. STF explicitly encourages collaboration, both by the design of the interface which includes multiple perspectives and by the provision that students can make annotations for comment by other students.