The WordPress Facilitator Training Program pairs every topic with three pieces of content: a self-guided course on Learn WordPress, a facilitation guide for delivering a 2 to 3 day workshop, and a slide deck for the facilitator to present from. This page walks through how the Training Team creates all three, using the co-writing prompts maintained in the WordPress/Learn GitHub repository.
This is a distinct path from the general Courses process. Standard Learn WordPress courses are drafted directly in Sensei. Facilitator Training Program content starts as a co-written draft, then follows the same GitHubGitHub GitHub is a website that offers online implementation of git repositories that can easily be shared, copied and modified by other developers. Public repositories are free to host, private repositories require a paid subscription. GitHub introduced the concept of the ‘pull request’ where code changes done in branches by contributors can be reviewed and discussed before being merged by the repository owner. https://github.com/ tracking, review, and publishing standards as any other Learn WordPress content once the course itself is ready.
Overview
Building a new Facilitator Training Program topic happens in three steps, in order:
- Draft the course using the Learn WordPress Course Co-Writer prompt.
- Build the facilitation guide from that course using the WordPress Facilitation Guide Builder prompt.
- Generate the slide deck from the facilitation guide, using either the Claude pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party. or the portable system prompt.
Each step depends on the one before it. Do not start the facilitation guide before the course is drafted, and do not start the slides before the facilitation guide is drafted. All three prompts live in the same repository folder: WordPress Facilitator Training Program.
For background on the program itself, its audience, and why it exists, see the WordPress Facilitator Training Program playbook in the Community Team’s Education handbook. This page covers the content creation process; that page covers the program.
Track the Work in GitHub
Facilitator Training Program courses are tracked the same way as any other Learn WordPress content development, through the LearnWP Content – Development project board. See How We Use GitHub for the full walkthrough of project boards, labels, and triage.
A few things specific to Facilitator Training Program courses:
- Open (or confirm) an issue for the course on the LearnWP Content – Development board before drafting begins.
- Use sub-issues to track each lesson under the main course issue, the same as any other multi-lesson course.
- Note in the issue which stage of the pipeline you are on (course draft, facilitation guide, or slides), so triage and reviewers know what to expect next.
Step 1: Draft the Course
Use the Learn WordPress Course Co-Writer prompt to draft the course itself: modules, lessons, learning objectives, and quizzes.
The prompt will walk you through:
- Collaboration mode (you choose one): AI drafts and you review, you provide rough content and AI refines it, co-writing section by section, or AI revising existing content.
- Intake questions covering audience, source material, learning objectives, quizzes, and format.
- A proposed outline (modules, lessons, and learning objectives) for you to confirm before any full drafting starts.
- Drafted content, checked in with you lesson by lesson or module by module.
The prompt applies the same standards as any other Learn WordPress content: BloomBloom's Taxonomy Bloom’s Taxonomy is a way of writing lesson plan objectives using specific words so that the objectives can be measured. See https://make.wordpress.org/training/handbook/guidelines/blooms-taxonomy/ for more details.’s TaxonomyTaxonomy A taxonomy is a way to group things together. In WordPress, some common taxonomies are category, link, tag, or post format. https://codex.wordpress.org/Taxonomies#Default_Taxonomies. for learning objectives, the Learn WordPress lesson structure, accessibilityAccessibility Accessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) standards, and the WordPress voice and brand rules. See Lesson Structure and Bloom’s Taxonomy for reference.
💡 Why this matters for reviewers: A course drafted with the Co-Writer prompt still goes through the standard Guidelines for Reviewing Content before it’s published. The prompt speeds up drafting; it does not replace SME or Editor review.
Once the course is reviewed and published on Learn WordPress, move on to Step 2.
Step 2: Build the Facilitation Guide
Use the WordPress Facilitation Guide Builder prompt to turn the finished course into a workshop-ready facilitation guide.
A few standing assumptions built into this prompt:
- The facilitator has already completed the source course. The guide is an operational delivery tool, not a way to teach the facilitator the material.
- The guide is designed for a single facilitator. Co-facilitators or support volunteers are the facilitator’s own operational decision.
- All learning goals come directly from the source course. The guide does not introduce new outcomes that aren’t already in the course.
The prompt walks through the same kind of process as the Co-Writer prompt: intake questions on workshop length and format, a proposed workshop arc for you to confirm, a full timed agenda, and then the complete guide, checked in with you day by day.
The output is a downloadable document (timed agendas, facilitator talking points, participant activity sheets, and appendices) attached to the course page on Learn WordPress, the same way the Leading WordPress Education Programs facilitation guide is attached to its course.
Step 3: Generate the Slides
Once the facilitation guide is drafted, use it (along with the course content) to generate the workshop slide deck. There are two ways to do this, depending on which AI tool you’re using.
Option A: The Claude plugin. If you have Claude with the Cowork tab (Pro, Team, or Max plan), install the wordpress-facilitator-slides-creation plugin. Start a new Cowork task, say “create workshop slides,” and it will walk you through a connection check, a brand review, and an outline approval before generating the full .pptx deck. See the plugin guide in the repository for installation steps and what you’ll need to have ready.
Option B: The portable system prompt. If you’re using a different AI tool (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude.ai without Cowork, or another assistant), paste the system prompt as your first message. It runs the same workflow but produces the deck as slide-by-slide text for you to copy into PowerPoint or Google Slides, rather than a ready-made file. See the system prompt guide for setup instructions for each tool.
Either way, have your course content, your facilitation guide, and a short description of your audience and goals ready before you start.
💡 Why this matters for brand consistency: Both paths are built to follow the WordPress brand guidelines and the WordPress Figma design system as their baseline. Don’t substitute a different brand or template. These decks represent the Facilitator Training Program and should always reflect WordPress’s visual identity.
Reference Example
The first Facilitator Training Program topic, Leading WordPress Education Programs, was built through this exact pipeline and is a useful model to reference:
- Course: Leading WordPress Education Programs
- Facilitation guide: Google Doc
- Slides: Facilitator Slides deck
Get Help
Have expertise in a WordPress topic and want to contribute a course, facilitation guide, or slide deck to the program? Or have questions about any step of this process? Reach out in #training on WordPress SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/, or connect with the Training Team.
