People learn best what is immediately useful (Postman & Weingartner, 1969). Working with teachers with a variety of experiences and backgrounds it is challenging to design a course which provides appropriately useful material. Teachers new to the classroom often have little use for theory, and are often in immediate need of activities that will get them through their five o'clock class. On the other hand, RSA or TESOL program graduates may not be enthused by a topic such as "Introducing Vocabulary Items." Accepting that people will seek out what is immediately useful to them, and that we can learn from the experiences of others, I have been working with teachers on a shared journaling project as preparation for an in-service training course. In this project, participants define the point at which the course should be located on Graves' (1991) continuum from training (skills and knowledge) to development (attitudes and awareness).