The Learning System
This project centered on a custom set of interactive design e-textbooks for Dixie Technical College. As the college instructor for these classes, I wrote the curriculum, designed the book system, created the course visuals, built the interactive media, and developed the class projects that students used alongside each lesson.
The books supported courses across Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign, After Effects, Premiere, UI/UX, drawing, composition, graphic design principles, and broader creative problem-solving. They were not meant to be generic software manuals. They were built as practical classroom tools that could support live instruction, hands-on projects, independent review, and different learning styles.
Curriculum Design Challenge
Teaching creative software and design principles in a classroom means balancing a lot at once: tool vocabulary, interface walkthroughs, step-by-step workflows, visual examples, critique language, project expectations, and the underlying design concepts that help students make better decisions after the tutorial ends.
The challenge was to organize that material into a repeatable digital textbook system that could scale across multiple courses while still feeling specific to each subject. Each book needed to work as a lesson companion, a project reference, a study guide, and a branded course resource that students could return to at their own pace.
Interactive Lessons for Different Learning Styles
The books used interaction and animation to make the material easier to revisit. If a student did not learn best by reading the same paragraph repeatedly, an animation could sit beside the topic and demonstrate the idea in motion. If a student struggled with long tutorial videos, the content could be broken into smaller visual steps, closer to a book-based walkthrough, while still keeping the clarity of animated instruction.
That combination helped the books support more than one kind of learner. Students could pause, skim, replay, compare examples, and move through the material in a way that made sense for them, without depending entirely on a lecture, a long video, or a static block of text.
Project-Based Course Materials
Every book was tied to custom class projects. The courses were hands-on and project-based, so the textbooks included download links that gave students access to the exact files, prompts, assets, and project materials being discussed in class. That meant students were not only reading about a tool or watching a concept; they were applying it immediately inside the same kind of work environment they would use for the assignment.
The books complemented lesson plans, lectures, demos, and in-class critique. They helped keep the course structure consistent while giving students a reliable place to return when they needed to review a process, rebuild a step, or catch up outside the classroom.
Visual and Layout System
The visual system used bold course colors, consistent cover framing, repeatable page structures, and a clear information hierarchy. That consistency helped students move between subjects without relearning the format of the material every time they opened a new book.
Inside the books, layouts were built for scanning. Steps, examples, software interface references, concept notes, and project instructions needed to feel organized enough for live class instruction but flexible enough for independent review.
Recognition and Student Outcomes
The curriculum and interactive textbook system were recognized by state education organizations for their innovative approach to adapting design instruction for students. The books also became part of how the school showcased its curriculum and competed through SkillsUSA.
Students used the same project-based learning structure to build competition-ready work, and the results showed up in a meaningful way. That year, I received recognition as an instructor for having more students place first in their SkillsUSA competitions than any other instructor at the event.
Motion and Course Identity
The course covers and animated previews gave the system a stronger sense of identity. Motion helped the books feel closer to the subjects they teach, especially for animation, video, and digital media courses.
This layer also made the project more useful as a promotional and onboarding asset, not only a classroom resource.
The result was one learning system that connected curriculum, interface thinking, graphic design, motion, and project-based instruction. It supported day-to-day teaching, gave students material they could revisit on their own, and helped turn the curriculum into stronger competition work.