Since the year 2000, the CRITE research group has been active in the area of lending technology to education in order to enhance the educational experience for both the learner and the educator. In order to facilitate such an endeavour, there is need of expertise in not only the educational profession but also, in the design and creation of engaging technological artefacts. Subsequently, within the group, there are individuals who have expertise, in the main, in one or other of the aforementioned domains but not necessarily in both. In order to create the artefacts, there is need for these individuals to communicate their respective knowledge to one another. A number of techniques have been deployed to facilitate the communicative process. These are the Storyboarding pattern and the Observation pattern.
The Storyboarding pattern is a technique deployed to facilitate practicing educators in communicating their ideas for pedagogially sound software to software developers. The means by which this is achieved is through the use of storyboards and the creation of prototypes which are refined on an iterative basis in order to realise the artefacts’ end designs. To assist in the refinement of each iteration of a prototype, both parties critique it from the perspective of their own expert knowledge. For example, the educationalist critiques it from the perspective of what theory of education is the most appropriate for conveying the concepts and for engaging the learner in a deep manner with them. Example questions that are posed and answered are: 'Should the content to be learned be embedded within the rules needed to play or engage with the artefact or should it be made explicit?' Equally, the educationalist critiques the artefact from the perspective of  a particular learner group, age bracket, type of learning activity to be facilitated and learning setting to which the artefact should be amenable towards.
On the other hand, the software developer critiques the artefact from the perspective of its level of interactivity and user interface design.  Both parties test the artefact to ensure  that it meets its base requirements and moreover, that it is reliable, user friendly and does what it is suppose to do.
Another means by which artefacts are evolved is through the use of Observation. This is technique whereby the teaching practices of an educator are directly observed by a software developer who quickly devises a design and prototype to enhance the teaching experience for both the educator and learner. Such a technique draws upon the creative power of the software developer whilst also, drawing upon the expert knowledge of the educator as all prototypes are critique by both parties to facilitate the creation of an artefact which is not only engaging but also, pedagogically sound.