Classroom Improvement Thoughts

Hello to the Skool team and the Skool Community.

First off, I was just weeks away from launching a course on Kajabi when I stumbled across Sam Ovens on Youtube, and I'm so glad I did!!!

Sam's insights on business, personal awareness, mental models and just about every other topic he covers have been instantly game changing for me. For this reason my base position is that with Sam's insights, and the team's skills and passion for this project, all areas of the platform which currently need improvements will be brought up to full potential in due time.

With that being said I would find it very helpful to have some deeper insights on what classroom improvements are pending.

While I understand and generally accept the premise that the community can be more valuable than the course material itself, I do also believe in the ability of well written, well shot, and well edited educational video content to change lives.

I have taken several online courses which had a relatively weak or non-existent community component that I took great value from, because just like a good book you read over and over, the content was on point.

Given that Skools foundation and differentiation is in its community model, it is totally understandable that a large portion of the upfront efforts have been allocated there to make sure it is industry leading, which I believe they have achieved.

However, my concern is that the classroom needs several key improvements, which I will list under the two broad categories of distraction proneness and gamification, both which could fall under the heading of user experience, and or user propensity to complete course material.

DISTRACTION PRONENESS:

1. Small Video Player:

The default video player is very small, vs some other leading course platforms with on app video hosting, that have options for the classroom setting which has a default video player screen which is nearly full screen.

I would love to see the curriculum tabs and the progress bar pushed to the far right of the screen, rather than so close to the middle of the screen, leaving so much empty room in the margins.

I realize that users have the ability to full screen their video, but we as the content creators and course facilitators cannot guarantee this gets done, and I believe it is better to automatically curate this experience.

2. Navigation Tabs In Classroom:

Other platforms have more of a “theatre” or “class is in session” feeling, where it is clear that while you are in the classroom, the purpose is to work through the modules with focussed intent. I am a big believer in deep work, and I think that the top navigation tabs back to community, leaderboard, and especially the profile icon which shows notifications while in the classroom is counterproductive to this end.

I believe the classroom should be more like a movie theatre, where there are only a few things you see: a) a huge captivating video

b) the module navigation bar far left of screen

c) an exit or back button to return to the full site navigation once you are done in the classroom.

I believe improvements of this nature would increase students' tendency towards working through the content rather than getting distracted and leaving.

GAMIFICATION:

Progress Tracking:

I assume this (as well as some of the above points) will be made available once on platform video hosting is available, but I believe that automatically updated in module progress tracking is very effective for helping people move through content.

In this I mean, if I finish watching half of a module, I can see a progress bar that I have watched half of the video, rather than just having the on/ off switch style of mark as done button once an entire module or lesson is complete.

Content Completion Points:

Right now the dopamine bias for a new user of the platform is designed to incentivize creating posts which generate likes, rather than to finish the content, execute the exercises, and get results.

I am curious if there is any intent in the future to incorporate points for completing course models, in a way that cannot be gamed by just pressing the mark as done.

I am far less experienced in course creation than almost everyone in this group, but my basic understanding of how to have a course be successful is to get students real results.

I think there is great value in having the students work through the material so that they are all communicating in the same language, rather than leaving the door open for students to tend towards skipping the course modules and just asking other people to do their homework for them.

I believe formally incorporating module completion into the points, levels, and leaderboard could be of great help towards this end.

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Why I am taking the time to write this long of a post:

Two wonderful partners who are the hosts of a leading Canadian business podcast and myself are about to launch an offer as a joint venture which will include a course and community component. I am tasked with the operations side of the equation, and so I am trying to take extreme care in ensuring that I pick the right environment for our community and content to grow. Further to this point, I have to rationalize the platform selection for this venture to more minds than just my own, so any help at all in indicating if these above mentioned items are in the sites of the Skool Team would be truly appreciated.

Either way - HUGE RESPECT & ADMIRATION for everything you are doing here Skool Team is creating.

Best regards,

Mitch

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