InnovateED 2026 · October 5
Discovering Claude
There are no slides. Scroll this page as we go. Every prompt is copyable, so you paste as we reach it and leave having done the work rather than watched it.
Two hours, no prior experience assumed. Taught by Nicole Patten.
Before we start
Two things open: this page, and Claude in another window. A free account does everything we do together.
- Have one task in mind that eats more of your week than it should. We will use your real one, not an example.
- If you have used ChatGPT or Copilot, your prompting habits transfer. Two things do not, and we will get to those.
Some of this will not work the first time. That is the point, and it is how you find where the edges are. When something misses you have not broken it and you are not behind. Change one thing and run it again.
What is actually happening when you type
Claude builds its answer a piece at a time from patterns it learned, rather than looking one up. That single fact explains most of what is about to surprise you.
- It is not a search index. There is no page it is retrieving and quoting back.
- Ask the same question twice and you can get two differently worded answers. Both can be right.
- Coming from ChatGPT or Copilot: your prompting skill carries over for free. Memory, files and governance work differently enough that assuming sameness causes real mistakes.
A differently worded answer is not a wrong answer. Judge the output on whether it is accurate and useful, not on whether it matches what you got last time.
Brief it properly
This is the single biggest improvement anyone makes. If you take one thing from today, take this one.
- Three things, every time: who it is acting as, what exactly you need, and what the output should look like.
- Skip any of the three and you are gambling on Claude guessing right.
Picture a capable new colleague on their first day. Sharp, fast, willing, and with zero context about your work. You would not hand them one line and walk away.
Before
Make me a bracket for our office tournament.
After
Build a bracket for a 14-team cornhole tournament, double elimination, best of three per match, played Monday through Thursday over two weeks. Make it a PDF in a clean minimal format. Use placeholder team names so we can fill in the real ones. Dark red accent color, and a headline that reads "We came to play!"
- It named the structure. Without that, Claude picks a format for you and you throw it away.
- It named the output. A PDF, not something I can print.
- It gave two words of visual direction, which removes a whole round of back and forth.
- It put the headline in quotation marks, because that has to read exactly one way.
- It said what to do about data that does not exist yet.
Now your turn. Fill this in and delete the brackets.
Your turn
Build a [what] for [who], covering [the specific content]. Output it as [file type: a one-page PDF, a slide deck, a table]. Structure: [sections, length, counts]. Style: [two or three words of direction]. Use [placeholder] wherever I have not given you real data.
Brief the task you brought
Write the full brief for the thing you need to produce. Then read your partner's cold and tell them what Claude would still have to guess at.
You are done when
- The prompt names the output format, not only the topic.
- Your partner cannot find anything left to guess at.
- Anything that has to read exactly one way is in quotation marks.
When it misses
The first draft comes back generic and a little stiff. The easy conclusion is that Claude is not good at this. That conclusion is wrong almost every time.
- Do not give up after one flat answer. One try tells you almost nothing.
- Do not re-ask the same way and hope. If the input does not change, the output will not either.
- Do not assume it knew context you never gave it.
When Claude misses, fix the prompt, not the tool. Treat it like a conversation with a new colleague, not a search box you either get right or wrong on the first try.
Before
This is not quite right, can you make it better?
After
Can you add some graphics or diagrams? Also the dark blue should be an accent color, since this needs to print we want a light background. I can also see some of the tips bleeding over the edge of the boxes.
- It named something missing. Better does not point at an absence.
- It gave the reason behind a change, because it has to print. The reason is worth more than the instruction, since it lets Claude apply the same logic to things you did not mention.
- It pointed at a defect you can see and Claude cannot.
A retry template, if you want one.
A retry template
Three things to fix: 1. It is missing [the thing that is not there]. 2. [This part] is wrong because [why]. 3. Change [this] to [that], because [the reason]. Keep the structure, change only what I named.
Name three defects, not one feeling
Take the output you just made and write a retry that names one thing missing, one thing wrong, and one reason behind a change.
You are done when
- Your retry names something absent, not only things you dislike.
- At least one instruction carries its reason.
- You ran it, and the second answer is closer.
What it actually makes
This is the part that resets what you think the tool is for. It is not a chat window that happens to write text.
- Documents, slide decks, spreadsheets, printable one-pagers.
- Charts and diagrams from numbers you give it.
- Analysis over a file you upload, not just commentary about it.
Run these one after the other and open both.
Run these one after the other
Create a five slide presentation about [your topic]. Now create a printable one page version of the same thing, written for someone brand new to it.
Same content, two different files
Pick something you could explain without looking anything up. Ask for it twice, the two ways above.
You are done when
- You have two files open, not two blocks of text in the chat.
- You can name one thing the deck does that the printable does not.
- You changed who it is for on the second ask and can see where that landed.
Why long conversations drift
Claude holds the whole conversation at once: everything you typed, everything it said back, everything you pasted. Once that fills up, something has to give.
- It is not forgetting out of carelessness. It has run out of room.
- When a chat starts contradicting itself or dragging in a topic from an hour ago, that is the signal.
- A fresh chat is not starting over. It is clearing the noise so it can focus on the thing in front of it.
Do not stay in a drifting chat out of habit, and do not paste your whole messy history into the new one. Carry across the two or three things that still matter.
When you are not sure, ask it.
Ask it directly
How full is your context window right now, and would this conversation benefit from starting fresh?
Confident is not the same as correct
Claude states a wrong answer in exactly the same tone as a right one. For anyone who publishes, teaches or advises, this is the section that matters most.
- Ask for the source. Then check the source yourself, rather than checking that a source was named.
- Anything consequential goes past a human who knows the subject.
Confident phrasing is not evidence. Treat every specific claim, a number, a date, a name, a citation, as needing a source until you have checked one yourself.
The verification prompt
List every factual claim in this draft that you are not fully certain about, including any numbers, dates, names, or citations, and tell me exactly where I should verify each one.
Run the check on something you made today
Take anything Claude produced for you in the last hour and run the prompt above on it. Read what it flags.
You are done when
- You have a list of claims it is not sure about.
- You picked one and actually went and checked it.
- You can say whether the list was useful or over-cautious.
What goes in, what stays out
The useful version of this is not a list of forbidden words. It is three piles, and the middle one is where most of the real work lives.
- Goes in as it is. Public material, your own drafts, your own notes.
- Goes in redacted. The same document with the two identifying lines removed.
- Stays out. Anything you could not defend having shared if someone asked tomorrow.
If you are unsure, ask yourself whether you would be comfortable seeing that exact text quoted with your institution’s name on it. If you hesitate, strip the identifying details before you paste, or do not paste it.
Sort your own week
Write down four things you worked on this week that you would plausibly hand to Claude. Sort each into the three piles, then swap and challenge one of your partner's calls.
You are done when
- All four are sorted, and none landed in stays out by default.
- At least one is redacted, and you can name the lines you would strip.
- Where your institution's own policy decides it, you know who to ask.
Where policy decides it, the answer is who to ask, not what we concluded in a workshop. Knowing the question is the useful part.
Make it remember you
Everything so far you retyped every time. You do not have to. Watch this one rather than following along, because what you can reach depends on your account.
- Five minutes in settings pays off in every conversation afterward.
- Instructions that apply everywhere stop you re-explaining who you are and how you want things written.
- It is a preference, not a contract. Change it whenever it stops fitting.
We will build one together now. You can redo it properly at your own desk with the instructions generator, which asks the same questions and hands you something to paste.
What is past today
Named so you know what to go looking for, not taught. Each of these is a session of its own.
- Projects, for work that comes back every week and should not start from nothing each time.
- Connecting Claude to the systems your documents already live in.
- The places Claude goes when it stops being a chat window and starts doing multi-step work on its own.
After today
One honest piece of advice, worth more than any further reading: pick a single task you do every week and use Claude on it five times. You learn the shape of what it is good at on work you already understand, which is the only way it gets fast.
This page stays up. Bookmark it and take the prompts with you.
If your team wants to go further together, the work we do is at claudetraining.com. No obligation, and no follow-up unless you ask for one.