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On September 1, 2022, GitHub Learning Lab will shut down.
Read more on the GitHub blog and check out GitHub Skills for courses backed by GitHub Actions.

Writing a course quickstart

GitHub Learning Lab is no longer accepting new public courses from outside of GitHub.

Quickstart: Writing Great Courses

A course on GitHub Learning Lab is an individual unit of interactive study. Learners complete a course by taking steps in a GitHub repository. When a learner takes a step, the Learning Lab bot responds and moves the course forward.

Learning Lab courses should take 20-30 minutes to complete. If you need more than one course to cover the topic you have in mind, you can create a learning path to show how the individual courses fit together.

1. Plan your course

Learning Lab courses are designed around hands-on application of the skills being taught. We've distilled the process we use to build courses into a step-by-step planning guide.

2. Build your course

Once you have a plan, it's time to bring it to life. Create the necessary boilerplate and repositories. Then substitute the template with your own starter code for learners. Finally, design the interaction with the learner. To edit the course once created:

  • Navigate to your Learning Lab dashboard https://lab.github.com/:owner/admin
  • Select the course from the list (it should be pending) to access the course dashboard
  • Click Edit course
GitHub Learning Lab's mascot There is also a course for Writing a Learning Lab.

3. Test your course

While your course is pending, you and other administrators of the course repository will be able to test the course. To access the pending version of the course, click View course page from the course dashboard.

4. Publish your course

When you're happy with your course, make it visible on Learning Lab by clicking Publish this course on the course dashboard.