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This paper describes the theoretical framework of a research project aimed at exploring the new potentialities for instructional systems offered by videodisc technology and artificial intelligence methodologies and techniques. In the context of this project, 'Earth', a prototype of ITS, is being developed, which embodies the ideas presented. In an instructional system, interaction can be characterized by three properties: adaptivity, reactivity and flexibility. The existing interactive systems are adaptive and/or reactive. Flexibility is a new dimension of interaction allowed by videodiscs. In a flexible system the user explores a multi-media database of educational material and learning is a consequence of this exploration. In the paper, we briefly describe some of the major development problems and discuss how AI techniques provide a means to prevent the user from getting lost in the learning material.

This chapter explores kindergarten children's use of specific online applications such as WhatsApp and YouTube to maintain social relationships between each other and with their classroom teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. Using Vygotskian theorisation of learning through interaction with more expert people (teachers and parents) and Leontev's theory of functional organ, this study verifies that children often learned without an expert's presence, using strategies such as trial and error and discussion, and through maintaining social relationships among themselves and with their teachers. Specifically, the study involved two Italian kindergartens (42 children) and six teachers. Analysis of the children's work and of teacher interviews shows that, during the Italian lockdown, the pre-school children used applications as learning environments in the form of functional organs, and this proved useful for carrying on kindergarten activities and for maintaining social relationships.

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The traditional approach to in-service teacher trammg is based on a transmissive model and on a hierarchical relationship between experts and trainees. By contrast, our work centres on collaborative training in workgroups and experience-based learning. In our model, knowledge building is the result of trainees interacting with an environment; the creation of interactive trainee communities dedicated to projects conducted in schools stimulates the emergence of shared knowledge. In this framework, we have developed a computer network infrastructure that integrates communication and collaboration, providing an efficient solution to distance workgroup activities in teacher training. Both the methodology and the tools developed are currently being tested in a national project funded by the Italian Ministry of Education.