The idea of patterns emerged from architectural design where it was discovered by Christopher Alexander that in successful building and city planning, commonly occurring patterns of design are apparent. A pattern is an abstract representation of a "common problem" and "effective solution" pairing. Patterns are developed by collecting case studies of both successful and unsuccessful designs, abstracting the key features of successful designs, communicating the patterns using a pattern language, and community validation of the patterns. Since its inception in architectural design the general concept of patterns has been adapted and applied to a number of other domains, e.g. software development, where its has been incorporated with the object concept as one of the primary means of facilitating reuse in development. In this presentation we will review attempts to adapt the pattern concept to the design of instruction and performance support. We will examine options for pattern description, and sharing. Experience using computer based training in the Coast Guard is presented as an example of how patterns can become a powerful tool in increasing the quality and perceived value of contemporary training and performance interventions.