How to Create a Course Resource Library on Notion
The easiest way to bump up the value of your course is to provide extra material for your students. This can be in the form of e-books, PDFs, and journal articles, and putting these together comes at no additional cost to you. It just requires a bit of time!
Now, if you’re wondering WHY on earth you need to provide additional resources when you’ve already prepared a course, don’t worry… like Codringher and Fenn (The Witcher), I have the answers.
Building a resource isn’t hard; you just need the right template to guide youI’mo, I’m not trying to sell you a Notion template… I would try, but there simply is no way for me to monetize it here in Dubai.
Before I tell you HOW to make your library on Notion, I’m going to tell you what your students expect from you.
1. FREE stuff
When students buy a course that’s anything upwards of $500, they expect that whatever is required to learn the skill is already in the course. That means no extra charges to access resources!
Which is fair… I never understood why colleges charge you separately for textbooks when you’re already paying them enough to buy a house. It makes way more sense to buy a few copies and keep them in the college library so students can borrow them for free. But that isn’t the point…
When building your library, make sure all the articles, books, and resources are freely available. Nothing should lead your students to a payment portal.
2. Include a short summary of the resource
Yes, it will take you a bit of time to write out summaries for the e-books and articles you provide, but it’s an essential step to building a helpful library.
Sometimes the article you provide would only be helpful to people who need a little extra help understanding concepts, while others don’t need the extra help. A summary will save your students time, and they will value the course all the more!
3. Keep it relevant
I have had clients who wanted to add their own books as a resource… and while it’s a great way to promote yourself as an expert in the field, it’s important to ask yourself: is it strictly necessary?
If you are teaching a mini-course on Writing the Perfect Short Horror Story, it will help to include articles and PDFs that delve into horror tropes, how to properly mix & match other genres with horror, and symbolism (like did you know zombies are a commentary on American consumerism? I’m writing a course on that right now, shameless plug).
But adding your horror short story to the mix wouldn’t be valuable in the resource library, although you are allowed to provide it as a freebie when people buy your course. Keep the library strictly for development and improvement.
4. Mix it up
Keep the resources a healthy mix of videos, podcasts, e-books, PDFs, and articles. If you dump a bunch of written material on your students, those who don’t have time to read will miss out on the wealth of information.
Consider that not all your students will be absorbing information through text and will need audio or visual aids, and hunt for resources accordingly.
Using Notion
Notion is the content creator’s lifeline. I plan my blog posts on it, and I’m now planning content for my LinkedIn and FB as well.
It’s also a FREE place to host your resource library!
Start by creating a new page for your library!
Give your page a name, and don’t worry about picking a template…
Just hit enter and give all the relevant information; the course name, navigating resources, and how students can contact you should they need to.
Now the fun part… adding the resources! Boy, do I have journal articles and videos.
Hit enter again and type “/gallery”. Pick the “inline” option.
Tim” to edit! Click the first page and start filling in the details…
You’ll have to modify the fields, of course, and for the Content-type, pick ‘select’ as the property type and add different formats so your students can filter things out by type.
These are all my formats:
Now that that’s done, I’m going to add a quick summary of the Hero’s Journey, even if every single writer and filmmaker knows it by now. And, of course, the links.
You don’t actually have to sit and write all the summaries yourself if you can’t. I personally like adding my personal touch to things, but for now, this is a summary from Wikipedia.
If you want to go the extra mile, you can find and add an image, so there’s a nice cover on the main library page. You can do this by simply dragging and dropping the image to the body of this page.
And ta-da!
🔒 Is there a way to password protect it so only MY students can access it?
In a word: no.
Now I know what you’re thinking… “why should I give this away for free?”
I hate to break it to you, but your students are capable of downloading and distributing this content even if you password protect it. There is always a risk of piracy, and if Disney can’t stop it, neither can you.
But keeping your library freely accessible encourages new learners to skim through and get intrigued about your course. Which is why I have also provided a link to it on the main page! They can go through all the resources, and if the topics and summaries interest them, they might feel compelled to buy my course and learn film theory from me.
Found this useful? Then help me out by subscribing and sharing this to LinkedIn or Twitter… it really helps!
And if creating a Notion library is too much work, hello! I provide all kinds of course building services. If you’re thinking of creating a course and need some guidance on structuring and scriptwriting, you can contact me through my website! I offer additional services like branding, animation, voice-over, and promotional content creation.
