Portfolio 02
Curriculum & Instruction
I write courses that end with the learner having built something. Then I teach them, train the people who teach them, and rewrite the parts that did not land.
How I build a course
Same process whether it runs six weeks or a year.
This is the work as I have actually done it, in the order I actually do it.
Find out who is in the room
Age, prior exposure, what they think they are signing up for, and what the school or the parent expects at the end. Getting this wrong is the single most expensive mistake, because everything downstream inherits it.
Decide what they will be able to do
Objectives written as things a person can perform and you can watch them perform, not things they will "understand." Then scope down, because the first draft is always too much for the time available.
Design the project first, lessons second
I start from the thing they will have built by the last session and work backwards. Every lesson has to earn its place by adding a piece of that build. Anything that does not gets cut.
Build the materials
Written lessons authored directly in the LMS, recorded and edited instructional video, slide decks, quizzes, and playable teaching games built specifically to demonstrate one mechanic in isolation.
Get it into instructors' hands
A course only works if the person delivering it can run it without me. Written instructor guidance, staff workshops, one to one training, and enough scaffolding that a new instructor is not improvising in week one.
Watch it fail and fix it
Student and instructor feedback after every run. The lessons that generate the most questions are the ones that are unclear, not the ones that are hard, and those get rewritten.
Curriculum built
Five platforms, one structure.
All project-based. In each case the student finishes with something they made and can show to somebody else.
| Platform | What students build | Why it is on the list |
|---|---|---|
| Construct 3 | Original 2D games with systems and mechanics they designed, not recreations of a demo. | Fastest path from zero to a playable thing. Event sheets teach logic without syntax getting in the way. |
| Minecraft | Builds and modded behavior that introduce logic and systems thinking inside a world they already know. | Removes the motivation problem entirely. They are already invested before the first lesson. |
| Java | Working programs, moving from syntax into structure and object-oriented thinking. | Where the training wheels come off. Real syntax, real errors, real debugging. |
| Unity | 3D and 2D projects in C#, connecting code they write to behavior they can see. | The bridge from "I can code" to "I can build in the tools studios use." |
| Unreal Engine | Projects built in Blueprints, with an emphasis on systems and game feel. | Visual scripting that is genuinely production grade, so ambitious students are not capped. |
Teaching
Subjects I have taught.
One on one and in groups of five to ten, all ages and ability levels, since 2016.
| Subject | Format | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Game Development | Groups and 1-on-1, in person and virtual | The bulk of my teaching. Beginner through students shipping original projects. |
| Programming | Groups and 1-on-1 | Java, C#, and visual scripting. First lines of code through object-oriented structure. |
| Mathematics | 1-on-1 | Physics degree with a correlate in math. Comfortable through calculus. |
| Physics | 1-on-1 | B.A. Physics, Vassar College. |
| Cello | 1-on-1 | Beginner and intermediate students. |
As Lead Trial Instructor I ran the first session families sat in on, and converted over 90 percent of those trials to enrollment. That number is a teaching result more than a sales one. Parents enroll when they watch their kid do something in an hour that the kid did not think they could do.
Where I did it
Game-U
Curriculum Creator, 2025 to 2026. Wrote project-based game dev curriculum across Unity, Unreal, and Construct 3. Recorded and edited instructional video, built slide decks and quizzes, authored directly inside the proprietary platform, and built supplementary playable teaching games.
Game-U
Project Lead, 2021 to 2025. Led a roughly ten person cross-functional team and took two initiatives from ambiguous concept to launch, including the online game dev learning platform that grew to hundreds of active students and about twenty public school partners in two years and is still the company's core delivery platform.
Game-U
Instructor and Lead Trial Instructor, 2019 to 2021. Live online classes one on one and in groups of five to ten, all ages and ability levels, including a range of learning needs.
Brainstorm STEM Education
Program Manager, 2016 to 2019. Designed and wrote a year-long game dev curriculum taught across school sites, trained roughly 100 instructors, ran staff workshops and one to one training, supervised daily operations, and ran summer cohorts of 30 or more.
Capabilities
Practiced, and familiar.
I keep these two lists separate on purpose. The first is work I have done on the job. The second is vocabulary and frameworks I know well enough to discuss and work inside, but have not formally implemented in a professional setting.
Practiced
- Curriculum authoring
- Lesson planning
- Project-based learning design
- Instructional video production and editing
- Slide decks
- Quizzes and assessment
- Instructor training
- Staff enablement
- Live virtual instruction
- In-person instruction
- LMS content authoring
- Cross-functional leadership
- User research
- Stakeholder communication
- AI-assisted content authoring workflows
Working familiarity
- ADDIE
- SAM
- Needs analysis / TNA
- Task analysis
- Performance-based objectives
- Bloom's Taxonomy
- Kirkpatrick's Four Levels
- SME collaboration
- ILT / vILT
- Train-the-trainer
- Job aids and performance support
I have not formally implemented ADDIE, SAM, or Kirkpatrick in a professional setting. I know the models, I can work inside them, and I would rather say that plainly than have it come up in week two.
Also
I take private students.
Game development, programming, math, physics, and cello. One on one, online or locally in Orange County, for students of any age.