Hi. Hamish here from the previous thread which MCP has already linked to.

Is this a one-off workshop? Do you know how many people and of what abilities you'll have attending?

You'll find that you can get through loads if you've a small group, but there's an inverse and logarithmic ratio of numbers against material. As soon as there's a wide range of abilities it means you either ignore some of them or can only skate over the bits which are of major relevance to each of them.

You need to be flexible in your approach and sensitive to their needs/wants/abilities.

I'd seriously avoid major re-tuning during a workshop: the open-D and standard EADGBE combination you seem to suggest, Merritt, sounds like asking for trouble!