From Prompt to Pages

I am designing a course and want you to serve as an instructional design partner. I will remain responsible for the pedagogical decisions. Your role is to help me analyze, organize, design, and eventually build the course based on the decisions I approve.

Here is the context for my course.

Course title and discipline:
Course level:
Course modality:
Course length:
Official course description:
Student learning outcomes:
Major assignments:
What students generally know or can do when they enter:
Areas where students are likely to need additional guidance or scaffolding:
My instructional priorities:
The experience and tone I want the course to have:

Do not design the course yet.

First, create a concise Course Design Brief that identifies:
1. The primary instructional needs of these students.
2. The appropriate level of scaffolding.
3. Likely navigation and organizational needs.
4. An appropriate instructional tone.
5. Potential areas of cognitive overload or confusion.
6. Design priorities for the Canvas environment.
7. Any important tensions or challenges I should consider when designing the course.

Separate conclusions based directly on the information I provided from assumptions you are making.

Do not make consequential instructional decisions based on assumptions. Identify those assumptions and ask me to resolve them.

Using the Course Design Brief we established and the decisions I have approved, help me develop the learning architecture for this course.

Do not change the approved Course Design Brief unless I explicitly ask you to revise it.

The course should be organized primarily around:
Here are required topics, content, readings, activities, or other elements that must be incorporated:
Here are any additional sequencing requirements or constraints:

Develop a course architecture that shows how learning progresses from the beginning of the course through students' final demonstration of learning.

For each module or major learning unit, identify:
1. Module title.
2. Central question, problem, or purpose.
3. Relevant student learning outcomes.
4. Essential content.
5. Learning activities or opportunities for practice.
6. Major assignment or deliverable, when applicable.
7. How this module builds on previous learning.
8. How it prepares students for what follows.

Prioritize intellectual progression and learning relationships rather than simply distributing content evenly across the semester.

Identify any places where the proposed sequence creates unnecessary cognitive load, assumes knowledge students may not yet have, or fails to adequately prepare students for a major assignment.

Do not create Canvas pages or HTML yet.

Using the approved Course Design Brief and Course Architecture, help me develop a consistent visual design system for the Canvas course.

Do not select colors yet.

The purpose of the visual system is to help students recognize the function and importance of information, navigate efficiently, and encounter a predictable course structure.

The recurring types of information in my course include:
The terminology I want students to encounter consistently includes:

Develop visual treatments for the recurring course components.

Consider components such as:
Learning objectives or guiding questions.
Required readings, videos, and other course materials.
Learning activities and practice.
Assignments and submissions.
Important information and deadlines.
Examples.
Optional or supplemental materials.
Help and support.

For each component, recommend:
1. A consistent label or heading convention.
2. Its relative position in the information hierarchy.
3. An appropriate visual treatment.
4. How it should be distinguished from other types of information.
5. What should remain consistent every time the component appears.

Prioritize clarity, accessibility, hierarchy, predictable navigation, and reduced cognitive load.

Avoid decorative elements that do not serve an instructional or navigational purpose.

Do not generate HTML yet.

Using the visual design system we established, develop an accessible and consistent color logic for this Canvas course.

Color must communicate function rather than simply decorate the page.

My existing course, university, department, or program colors that I may want incorporated are:

Create a limited palette for these functions:
Course Identity
Action
Information
Attention
Support
Neutral

For each function, provide:
1. The recommended color.
2. The HEX code.
3. The instructional meaning of the color.
4. When the color should be used.
5. When the color should not be used.
6. Recommended text color when used as a background.
7. Any accessibility or contrast concerns.

The palette should work as a coherent visual system.

Do not rely on color alone to communicate meaning. Labels, headings, text, borders, or other visual cues must reinforce the function.

Do not introduce additional colors without explaining why they are necessary.

Do not generate HTML yet.

Conclude with a concise Course Color Style Guide that can be reused in future prompts.

Using all of the course design decisions we have established and I have approved, create a reusable page architecture for this Canvas course.

Do not change the established visual language or color logic.

Create structures for these three page types:
Start Here or Home Page
Module Overview Page
Assignment Page

For each page type, identify:
1. Primary instructional purpose.
2. Information students need immediately.
3. Recommended content sections.
4. Information hierarchy.
5. Reusable visual components.
6. Primary student call to action.
7. Navigation to or from the page.
8. Elements that should remain consistent every time this page type appears.
9. Elements that can change according to the content.

Design these pages as parts of one coherent course system rather than three unrelated pages.

Do not generate HTML yet.

Using the approved course design system and page architecture we established in this conversation, create the Canvas-compatible HTML for this page.

I am building this page type:
Here is the content that belongs on this page:

Follow all previously approved rules for:
Information hierarchy.
Visual language.
Color logic and HEX codes.
Page architecture.
Recurring components.
Accessibility.
Navigation.
Student calls to action.

Use clean HTML appropriate for the Canvas LMS HTML editor.
Use semantic heading hierarchy.
Use inline styling when styling is necessary for reliable Canvas rendering.
Maintain sufficient text and background contrast.
Never communicate meaning through color alone.
Use descriptive link text.
Maintain consistent spacing and hierarchy.
Keep the design readable on smaller screens.
Avoid unnecessary decorative elements.
Do not introduce new colors, components, terminology, fonts, or visual conventions without my approval.
Do not redesign the page.

Your task is to translate the design system we already approved into functioning HTML.

Provide the complete HTML code in one code block so that I can copy and paste it into the Canvas HTML editor.

After the code, explain the major structural components and identify anything I should specifically inspect after Canvas renders the page.

The HTML you created is now rendering in Canvas.

Most of the page should remain unchanged.

Here is what is working correctly:
Here is what happened when Canvas rendered the page:
Here is what I expected to happen:
Here is the specific element or behavior that needs to change:

Revise only what is necessary to correct this problem.

Preserve the approved design system, content, colors, hierarchy, spacing, components, and all elements that are already working unless changing one of them is technically necessary to solve the problem.

Explain what caused the issue if you can identify it.

Then provide the complete corrected HTML so I can replace the existing code in Canvas.

Audit this Canvas page against the instructional and visual design system we established earlier in this conversation.

Do not automatically praise the page.

Evaluate it critically according to:
1. Instructional hierarchy.
2. Clarity.
3. Navigation.
4. Cognitive load.
5. Accessibility.
6. Color logic.
7. Visual consistency.
8. Student calls to action.
9. Mobile readability.
10. Consistency with the approved page architecture.
11. Alignment between the page design and its instructional purpose.

For every problem you identify, explain:
What is wrong.
Why it matters for student learning or usability.
How significant the problem is.
What should change.

Also identify elements that are working particularly well and should remain unchanged during revision.

Separate necessary revisions from optional improvements.

Do not rewrite the HTML until I approve the recommendations.

Using the approved course design system and the final approved version of the Module Overview template, create the next module.

Preserve the existing:
Page architecture.
Visual hierarchy.
Color logic.
Component structure.
Terminology.
Navigation conventions.
Accessibility standards.

Do not redesign the template.

Here is the content for the new module:

Replace the previous module-specific content with the new content while preserving the approved system.

Provide the complete Canvas-compatible HTML.