Using the Outline Template

[00:00 - 00:08] All right, so let's talk about the outline template in a little bit more detail . You can make a copy of this template for yourself and just be clear, we're not going to be writing our whole course in Google Docs.

[00:09 - 00:14] We have hacker tools that will make it a lot easier. We're just going to be using Google Docs for this outline.

[00:15 - 00:24] And I also want to point out that we're making improvements to this document as we go. So the version that you're seeing here in this video may not be exactly what you're going to see when you make a clone of the template.

[00:25 - 00:35] So go with what's in your template as it's going to be more up to date than what's in this video. In the beginning of the doc, we'll specify the formats we're looking to build.

[00:36 - 00:51] The requests for courses right now, we're looking to do one of two things, primarily new line guides, which are these up to date in depth resources on a particular subtopic. So you know, for example, maybe the new line guide to authentication and react in 2020.

[00:52 - 01:05] This covers everything from JWT tokens to cookies, sessions, implementing password, reset form fields, that sort of thing. The idea is that for this slice of the technology, it'll be the definitive resource on that topic.

[01:06 - 01:17] Apps from scratch is what it sounds like, which is you're basically taking an app idea and you're building it from scratch, you know, we say from empty folder to deployment. We talked earlier in these videos about the research process.

[01:18 - 01:27] You can skip to the bottom and then this is where you can copy and paste your research. So you know, you may as well just have an outline or and you can paste these links and a little description of each one.

[01:28 - 01:40] After you've done a little bit of research, you can try to formalize the description of the course that you want to do. So fill out this form, you know, say, what is the context of the topic you're going to teach?

[01:41 - 01:43] Why is it a problem? Why do people need to learn this?

[01:44 - 01:51] If they don't use the solution you're offering, what's the difficulty of doing it the old way? What will the student learn when they're done with this course?

[01:52 - 01:54] How are you going to teach the material? What's an overview?

[01:55 - 02:00] And what are the prerequisites for the student that you visualize? This can take a little bit of time.

[02:01 - 02:15] You know, and then after you have this, this might, you know, this might be close to a page or half a page of material. Try to summarize the idea in just one sentence using this template, who it's for the statement of opportunity, the course name, you know, you can read this.

[02:16 - 02:19] I don't have to read it to you. But it can be a bit tricky.

[02:20 - 02:25] So don't be surprised if filling this out takes a few minutes and this isn't set in stone. You can write a couple of different versions.

[02:26 - 03:01] But maybe this reads something like, for intermediate programmers who know JavaScript but don't know TypeScript or React, who want to learn to use TypeScript and React fluently and build a SAS app that makes money, you know, the full stack react with Type Script and serverless is a course that shows you how to build a real world SAS app using TypeScript and serverless. Unlike shallow blog posts or five minute videos, our course will walk through every step from empty folders to deployment, as well as handle real world issues like authentication and taking payments, you know, something like that.

[03:02 - 03:18] If you can condense the idea of what you're doing in this sentence, it's, it'll give you a really clear direction and it will help everyone really understand what you 're trying to accomplish. Now we're ready to start actually filling out the outline.

[03:19 - 03:24] The structure that we use is a two level hierarchy. So we have modules and lessons.

[03:25 - 03:46] So modules are groups of lessons kind of covering one big idea and individual lessons are maybe about 10 minutes long, give or take. What you want to do here is copy and paste the modules and lessons and I have numbers here but to be honest, I actually find it's a lot easier to leave them off because then it's a lot easier to reorder them.

[03:47 - 03:55] The key thing that I want you to do in each section is you need to fill out what you will learn. Why is someone taking this lesson?

[03:56 - 04:01] What is the benefit to them? Another way this is phrased in schools is like a learning objective.

[04:02 - 04:15] But what what you want to be able to do is specify clearly what is the key thing someone is going to learn within a module and then within a lesson. What is the key takeaway that you're teaching?

[04:16 - 04:21] Just try to teach one or maybe two ideas. In every lesson you want to specify what you will learn.

[04:22 - 04:29] After you've defined what you will learn, you can decide the code examples. Oftentimes we'll have continuity of the app between lessons.

[04:30 - 04:40] So you could mention the shopping cart app and then like a particular section within that app, you know, the checkout page or even just a form. Or maybe you have a new app for a different module or a different lesson.

[04:41 - 04:49] Just try to make a first pass decision about what each code example is going to be. I'll give some tips for picking out good code examples in a future video.

[04:50 - 04:59] But first let me give you some tips on how to write a good outline. I think one of the biggest tips is teach how you'd actually do it at work.

[05:00 - 05:10] This means you deal with what is hard. What I think happens is that coding teachers often get into a project and they say, oh, you know, that's too complicated or I'm going to teach this the easy way.

[05:11 - 05:18] And the problem is there are tons of blog posts that already cover the easy way . People are paying us to show them the hard way, the real way.

[05:19 - 05:24] So don't shy away from the hard stuff. Show how you'd actually do it at work.

[05:25 - 05:31] Another thing to remember is that the API docs exist in the world. Someone who comes to our course has probably already seen the API docs.

[05:32 - 05:44] Why didn't the API docs work for them? It's two reasons, one, because the API docs go through every possible perm utation of how to use, say, a library in every situation.

[05:45 - 05:51] Even the edge cases that aren't that useful. And two, the API docs don't cover everything that you need to actually ship an app.

[05:52 - 06:02] So when writing this outline, I want you to think vertically, meaning think not only about how to call an API, but how does it integrate around the edges with your app? You know, how do you set up your dev tools?

[06:03 - 06:07] How do you organize your files? What's the rubric that you use to evaluate third-party libraries?

[06:08 - 06:23] How do you decide what to test? Bring everything you know from your experience at work and try to inject how you think about the problem into this work as much as actually writing code.

[06:24 - 06:36] The opposite of a good outline or like a bad outline would be if you just wrote out a list of topics like you'd see in the API docs. Just write a table of contents of the API that already exists.

[06:37 - 06:40] Students crave real world apps. So give them a real world app.

[06:41 - 06:55] It's better to go deep into fewer things than to cover a lot of things in a really shallow way. You know, a good question to ask yourself is, am I uncovering understanding or am I discovering material?

[06:56 - 07:03] So with that in mind, try filling out your outline. Go through this document, come up with an initial list of modules and lessons.

[07:04 - 07:06] We might change them down the road, but just give it your best shot. Talk soon.

[07:07 - 07:09] (upbeat music)