Developing Written Course Content: Personal Experience Insights

In our Personal Experience Insights series, members of the Everspring Learning Design department share first-hand accounts of creating online learning content and meaningful takeaways from their professional experiences.

Amalia Schwee is an Associate Director of Instructional Design and the Quality Assurance Principal in the Learning Design department at Everspring. She has a PhD in Learning Sciences from Northwestern University and lives in Chicago, Illinois.

Brooke Hurm is a Quality Assurance Specialist in the Learning Design department at Everspring. She has a Bachelor of Arts in English and experience in both teaching and editing roles.

In our quality assurance roles, we routinely review course content created by subject matter experts in collaboration with instructional designers. Our reviews can cover a wide range of course features, from learning management system settings to accessibility to workload. Often, our reviews also involve copyediting.

When we aren’t reviewing course materials, we are often producing written content for the Learning Design department. Our content production experiences have given us insight into the challenges that anyone might encounter when trying to craft (and polish) written materials. When producing new reference materials for our department, for example, we seek to align our new content with preexisting materials as closely as we can, but occasionally discover that a set stylistic standard wasn’t put in place for specific elements, such as whether and how certain job titles are abbreviated. This can result in a much larger alignment and editing endeavor than initially anticipated.

We also recognize that these challenges can be especially significant for online courses, given the volume of written content they often include. Whether or not you have experience developing asynchronous course content, the prospect of writing down all of the key statements you typically make in a face-to-face course, for example, can be daunting.

The following list describes recommended approaches to and strategies for developing written content, grounded in our experiences as writers and reviewers. Incorporating these recommendations into your writing process can make developing polished written content easier and more efficient.

Inconsistencies in spelling and word formatting (e.g., hyphenation) can detract from clarity and distract readers from essential elements of your written content. Selecting reference sources for spelling and word formatting before you begin writing can help ensure your content starts out and remains consistent throughout the development process.

To begin, we recommend selecting one dictionary to use as your primary reference. Additionally, you might also reference a style guide or guidelines specific to your institution or discipline. For example, our primary source of guidance for spelling and word formatting is the Merriam-Webster dictionary. While this covers most of our needs, we supplement Merriam-Webster’s guidance with the list of preferred spellings for technology terms from our preferred style guide.

Like inconsistencies in spelling and word formatting, variation in capitalization can similarly distract readers and reduce the clarity of your written material. Consider the case of a business course delivered via the Canvas learning management system that focuses on the development of a business model canvas. In such a context, variance in capitalization for “Canvas” might result in unnecessary confusion. Before you begin writing, try to determine which key terms in your materials will truly need capitalization, and select one set of guidelines to follow for capitalization within headers, references, citations, and other standardized elements of your content. If you require your students to submit written work that conforms to certain style guidelines, adhering to those same guidelines in all elements of your written content will help build students’ understanding and ensure examples of proper formatting are readily available.

Creating an outline before you begin writing your content can help you stay focused and organized. An outline forces you to define your purpose—why you're writing and what you want the reader to take away. It helps ensure every part of your content aligns with the topic and the applicable learning objectives, keeping you from going off track. For example, when developing content for a lecture page, an outline can help you see the sequence of concepts, examples, and activities before you draft the full set of materials. This ensures the content builds logically from foundational concepts to more complex ideas and directly supports the course’s learning objectives. With a clear structure in place, you can more easily decide where to include visuals, case studies, or other active-learning elements without disrupting the lecture’s flow.

Start by breaking your content into main topics, subtopics, and examples, creating a roadmap. Each paragraph should have a specific role and naturally lead to the next paragraph. This structure ensures your ideas flow in a coherent, logical order, making your writing easier for readers to follow. Seeing all your points laid out allows you to spot missing information or areas where you may be repeating yourself. You’re also less likely to include irrelevant details when working from a plan. You can evaluate each idea or piece of content by asking, “Does this support my main point?” and “Does the content align with the learning objectives?” If not, remove it. Once your outline is complete, you can write faster and more confidently because you know what each section needs to cover.

Inconsistent styling can create confusion, disrupt comprehension, and make content harder to access. Even the most well-written material can seem disorganized or incomplete if formatting is irregular.

As you write, seek to format your text content consistently. Consistent, accessible text formatting—such as uniform list styles, heading structures, and emphasis (like bold or italics)—helps guide the reader’s attention, improves readability, and enhances accessibility for all users. For example, ensuring all course pages of the same type have the same heading structure creates a clear visual hierarchy, making content easier to scan and understand, and provides a consistent layout throughout the course (World Wide Web Consortium Web Accessibility Initiative, n.d.). Clear, predictable formatting helps screen readers interpret content correctly and allows users with cognitive or visual impairments to navigate information more easily.

Another way to apply consistent formatting is to ensure all lists are formatted the same. We recommend using bulleting as this format can be applied to most lists without causing any confusion. Numbered lists should generally be avoided when not listing items in a chronological or rank-ordered fashion because they can mislead the reader. Using a numbered list can unintentionally suggest a sequence or process, or lead readers to mistakenly assume that item order is significant. We recommend reserving numbered lists for instructions, procedural steps, and chronological information.

Using abbreviations consistently is essential for maintaining clarity and accessibility in your writing. According to American Psychological Association (APA) guidelines, writers should spell out a term in full on first use and then provide the abbreviation in parentheses—as shown in this sentence (American Psychological Association, 2021). When abbreviations are introduced properly, they help readers understand the content without confusion. Using abbreviations appropriately can help distinguish between similar or near-identical abbreviations that are frequently used in industries such as healthcare and finance. Inconsistent or unexplained abbreviations can be especially challenging for readers unfamiliar with the subject or those using screen readers, which may not interpret them correctly. Clear, consistent abbreviation usage ensures that all readers, regardless of background or ability, can follow your content with ease and confidence.

Clear, effective writing is essential for creating engaging learning material. A structured review checklist ensures that every piece of content meets quality standards, aligns with learning objectives, and contributes to an inclusive, accessible learning experience.

When building your checklist, organize it into clearly defined sections—this makes the review process more intentional and less overwhelming. For course content, it’s especially helpful to include sections for both general writing quality and criteria specific to course development. This dual approach helps to strengthen both communication and instructional design.

Checklists are flexible tools—customize yours to suit the needs of each project. You can include a few core checks or a comprehensive review. Here is an example of items you might consider including in your checklist:

• Clarity: Is the writing clear and easy to understand for the target audience?
• Concision: Are ideas communicated without unnecessary words or repetition?
• Tone: Is the tone appropriate (e.g., professional, encouraging, instructional)?
• Consistency: Are terms, formatting, and style used consistently throughout?
• Transitions: Do paragraphs and sections flow smoothly with clear connections?

• Factual accuracy: Are all statements and examples factually correct?
• Relevance: Does all content serve the main purpose or applicable learning objective(s)?
• Audience fit: Is the content appropriate for the learners’ knowledge level?

• Clarity of instructions: Are directions for activities or interactions clear?
• Chunking for readability: Are paragraphs and sections broken into digestible segments?
• Accessibility considerations: Are examples inclusive? Are visuals described where needed?

When it comes time to review your work, we recommend conducting your review in two phases. First, review for content accuracy and completeness. Have you addressed all key topics and subtopics adequately? Are topics and subtopics presented in the ideal order? Are conceptual connections sufficiently clear and robust? Once you are satisfied with your material from a content coverage standpoint, we then recommend reviewing for punctuation, spelling, grammar, and capitalization. Separating your review into distinct phases helps reduce cognitive load and streamline your efforts to enhance content quality. If you develop a review checklist, you can readily organize items to align with this two-phase approach.

Up to this point, our recommendations have focused on steps writers can take independently to produce high-quality written content. However, when your content is nearly complete, it can be valuable to solicit a second opinion. In particular, having someone who isn’t a subject matter expert review your work can help surface blind spots and identify elements of your material that might present challenges for students. Seeking such input and implementing requisite adjustments can help you deliver your course content with extra confidence.

Developing written course content is often a major undertaking. While the process can feel daunting even with ample preparation, implementing the recommendations outlined here can streamline your development workflow and help ensure your final content shines.

American Psychological Association. (2021, December). Definition of abbreviations.

World Wide Web Consortium Web Accessibility Initiative. (n.d.). Section headings (Level AAA).