This post contains a Skillshare affiliate link. This means that if you click on the link and make a purchase, I will receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.
I talked about my initial 3 months review of Skillshare back at the end of September. They have made a lot of changes since then, so look forward to a one year update about how thoughts have changed this summer. For today, as you might have guessed by the title, I have a different discussion about Skillshare. Instead of the student perspective, I’m discussing the new teacher perspective.
I was invited to apply for the Skillshare Teach Challenge back in November and was accepted into it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to complete my class by the due date, but it did get me started and I wanted to discuss my thoughts on the Teach Challenge, the actual work of making a class, and how it all ended up.
The Teach Challenge is a lot like their workshops were (those have since been removed from their site in place of Chroma courses, but that is a different discussion). There are set dates to turn in parts of your class work for and get feedback from other peers who are making their own classes as well. In my experience, there was some interaction with this but a lot of it was more of an accountability post to keep on track. However, I did find it helpful, especially in the planning stage to have others to help offer insight. It can be valuable, especially if you are making something instructional, to have other perspectives because at times we can think something is clear but that’s because we have the footnotes in our head that others do not have.
Skillshare has a really great set of resources around setting up a class, including a workbook to outline your class description, project, and video lessons. They also have a lot of their own articles and videos about tips and tricks to making classes. There is also a strict set of guidelines to follow to keep your class on the same quality level as the rest of the classes on the website.
My process had some ups, a lot of downs, and we’ve ended up with a result finally, five months after the fact. Not all projects work out smoothly.
This is not Skillshare’s fault at all, I want to be clear. This is just due to life sometimes tripping me up a bit and struggles to hit certain requirements with the materials I had on hand.
The resources were really helpful, specifically that workbook I mentioned. I had a few ideas of what I wanted to do, so I was able to pick one and really bring it to life through filling out the workbook. I would say this brainstorming and planning out was the easiest (and my favorite) part of the process. Their instructions were also clear and had some recommendations within it to help guide me whenever I got stuck.
I also found that being in the Skillshare community was really valuable because I was aware of the pattern and structure of the classes to begin with and as well the type of projects I could make based on the ones I enjoyed doing. So, after making my outline, I made my project workbook as a fun, open ended space to answer in the guided form of whatever way your brain best works with a piece of paper and a pen.
In terms of tools needed, I just used Microsoft Word which I already had on my computer. I should also note at this point their resources are available to download as word documents as well so you can edit in the file to fill in your class information.
Then, I left it alone for a bit. Distance makes the heart fonder and the editing eyes sharper, after all. I revised the outline and workbook, felt good about how things were shaping up, and was mostly on track if not a bit behind where I was supposed to be.
Did you hear the foreboding music? Yes, this is the point where it all went wrong. Well, that’s a bit harsh, what happened was I got overbooked and overwhelmed, and, unfortunately, this class got pushed to the back burner. Personally, things like presenting and teaching take a lot out of me, so I knew that I needed to approach this on a good day or the quality just wouldn’t be up to the level I’d be okay with posting, and I’d be compelled to just redo it better anyway.
I also found that, while they said we didn’t need to make a super detailed outline, I ended up needing a bit more of a detailed outline than I had initially drafted. Laying out more about the slides, videos, and thumbnail sketches of how I wanted things to look gave me a bit more mental space to actually begin working on the non-recorded parts.
At this point, I should bring up that the class is about how to work productively with yourself, and a (spoiler alert?) major takeaway of the class is being able to understand where you need support and how to either get it for or give it to yourself. In being overwhelmed with everything and trying to make an entire class with multiple lessons and an overarching story to it, it was really important for me to break the process down not just into pieces but the smallest pieces I reasonably could to give myself small wins and build up positive momentum to get this class done regardless of being after the six week Teach Challenge and still not even getting to the actual class making yet. This helped me remove some of that overwhelm by being able to se that needle of progress inching closer towards done.
In addition to blocking the visual scenes, I also ended up needing to write scripts for myself. In general, I don’t often work off more than bullet points, but when I’m anxious I find it helpful to layout sentences I know work for this purpose so that I can adjust as I’m talking but have a safety net to fall back on. I perhaps made this in a different order than others do. I put together my entire class in terms of slides and videos, then returned to my outline and wrote my scripts with the outline, revising to the videos.
This ended up working out best for me because I had a better idea of the visual part I wanted to tell and how to convey that and I wanted to make sure my words supported the class as best as they could by offering a read aloud version of the on screen work but also additional tidbits and thoughts on matter. I edited this with the visuals.
Overall, the creating up to this point was not technically difficult. I used a free video editor (VSDC) and free audio editor (Audacity). While editing took me an incredibly long time, I set low stakes for myself. The class is visually simple, and that is on purpose. I would say the difficulty was more emotional about learning how to get past perfectionism and open myself up to try new things. By setting low stakes for the video editing, it helped remove a lot of boundaries I had up as excuses as to why I couldn’t make the class. This is where that “done is better than perfect” phrase comes in.
The main technical challenge for me was trying to export things to the proper rates. I ended up having to download extra tools and reexport parts multiple times. Thankfully actually uploading and making the class is relatively straightforward. The only thing I struggled with was that you can really only upload one video at a time and it takes awhile. When it fails, it doesn’t tell you the specific reason why, so I ended up just having to guess and check the issue quite a few times. I got there in the end, and it was all uploaded.
The final thing that happens to your class once you’ve gotten it all set up is that it gets checked by a member of the Skillshare team to ensure it hits all the guidelines. Which is when the class I had spent three months making got taken down in violation. I had misinterpreted one of the guidelines, but the Skillshare team member I worked with was incredibly kind and clear about the issue (as opposed to that video uploader, ha ha). But, then I re-encountered that overwhelm problem once again as I hadn’t thought to build in a buffer to my work time about fixing any issues. I also built up the amount of time it would take to fix the issue in my head which led to a lot of resistance about actually just getting it done.
To end the long journey here, I got it fixed and uploaded. They reassessed it incredibly quickly, and it is now officially released into the (Skillshare) world! So, I’d love for you to check it out through my referral (no extra charges for you) link* and give it a try. It’s focused on how to work productively with yourself, which was beneficial for me to work on as I struggled to the end of this experiment in making my first ever class.
As with all my experiments, I like to not just think about the process and what went wrong or right, but just an overall, “Would I do it again?” and “Would I recommend it?” Yes, to both. I think that as with anything making a class takes time and practice to get comfortable and better at it. While I don’t love teaching in academics, I do enjoy the learning community in a more informal and self-driven setting which I think is really well displayed in the Skillshare community. As well, both for doing it again and recommending it, I think that Skillshare does a great job balancing having strict and well-defined rules with still making it accessible and easy to upload and create classes.
I would caution, however, that this doesn’t seem to be a great place to make money immediately depending on what specific subsection of Skillshare you are making classes in. However, that doesn’t mean it can’t be, but doing research into their rules and their class subjects is highly recommended. I also think that you’ll have an edge if you have already been a part of the community before creating your class so that you know what to be looking for in your own work. If you are interested in teaching in one of the areas Skillshare focuses in, this can be a great place to start with a built-in audience.
I do hope that the next time I try making a class (don’t ask me when that’ll be. I don’t know yet, though I do have some more ideas) that it won’t take as long or be as overwhelming. In the end, this experiment worked, and I would do it again, but the journey was not as smooth as I would have liked. I think I will classify this experiment, therefore, as a neutral success.
*Updated 2023: Due to changes in Skillshare’s requirements, this class has been removed from the listing. Thank you to all who checked it out. I do still, however, have a general affiliate link for Skillshare.
