Guide for hosts
How to teach a class inside an experience, workshop or retreat
Teaching a single class inside a retreat, a workshop or a stand-alone experience is a narrower job than teaching in general, because you already know who's in the room, how much time you actually have, and what they're there for beyond the class itself. That context changes what good teaching looks like here compared with a classroom or an open online course with strangers who found you cold.
What's different about teaching inside an experience or retreat, versus teaching in general?
Teaching in general often starts from a blank audience: you don't know who showed up, what they already know, or what else is competing for their attention that day. Teaching inside an experience, a workshop or a retreat starts with far more known. The group chose this specific thing, they're often already warmed up by whatever happened before your session, and you have a fixed, usually short window rather than a semester to work with.
That changes the job in a useful way. You don't need to build rapport with strangers from zero, and you don't need a syllabus. You need a class that earns its specific slot: clear enough to deliver real value in the time you have, and connected enough to the rest of the day that it doesn't feel like a detour from what people came for.
What should you decide before you ever teach the class?
Decide who's actually in front of you, what they should be able to do or understand by the time you stop talking, and how much time you genuinely have, including the part that always runs long. Skip any of those three and the class tends to drift toward whatever you find most interesting to explain, which isn't always what the room needs.
The "what they leave with" question matters more than it sounds. A class that leaves people with one thing they can use is usually stronger than one that covers five things they'll mostly forget by dinner. Decide that one thing first, and build everything else around protecting it, cutting content that doesn't serve it rather than squeezing more in.
How do you structure a single class so it holds attention?
Open with why the topic matters to this specific group, teach the core of it in a block people can follow without taking frantic notes, then give them a chance to use it before you move on. A class that's pure explanation from start to finish, even a genuinely interesting one, starts losing people well before the end if nothing changes in how it's delivered.
A simple shape covers most situations: a short opening that connects the topic to why this group is here, the main teaching block broken into pieces rather than one long stretch, and a closing moment where people do something with what you just taught, even something as small as answering a question out loud or trying it once. That closing moment is often the part people remember longest, more than any single thing you said.
How do you teach a class online instead of in person?
The content can stay largely the same; what changes is how you check that people are actually with you. In person you can read the room by watching faces and posture. Online, you lose most of those signals, so you need to build in more explicit ways to check in: asking people to respond in the chat, unmuting to answer a direct question, or using whatever polling or reaction tool your platform offers.
Keep the technical setup simple and tested before the class starts, not during it. A class that opens with several minutes of "can you hear me" and "I think you're muted" has already spent its best attention on nothing. Decide ahead of time how you'll handle the moment something doesn't work, a shared screen that won't load, someone who can't get audio, rather than improvising it live in front of the group. And build in the same structure you'd use in person: a clear opening, a teaching block broken into pieces, and a moment where people actually do something, since an online class with no interaction at all is the fastest way to lose a room you can't even see.
How do you keep a class interactive instead of a lecture?
Ask real questions at natural pause points and build in at least one moment where people do something rather than only listen. A class can be interactive without turning into a group discussion that runs away from your plan; even a quick question with a show of hands, or thirty seconds for people to try something themselves, breaks the lecture rhythm enough to keep attention from flattening out.
Watch for the moment attention starts to slip, usually visible even online through fidgeting, dropped eye contact, or a chat that's gone quiet, and have a planned way to reset it rather than talking louder or faster. A short pause, a direct question to the room, or moving people into a brief paired exercise usually does more than pushing through the content at the same pace.
When does a single class turn into something repeatable?
Once you notice you're teaching some version of the same class more than once, whether inside different retreats, different workshops, or on request, that's usually the signal it's worth turning into its own structured offering rather than something you build fresh every time. At that point it's worth deciding whether it becomes its own standalone workshop, with a repeat schedule and its own price, or stays as a module you slot into other things you host.
The fuller version of that decision, including what changes once a class or a session becomes a repeatable business rather than something you do once in a while, is on turning a workshop into a business.
Questions hosts ask
How long should a class be?
Long enough to cover the one thing you've decided people should leave with, and short enough to fit cleanly inside whatever slot it has in the day, whether that's forty-five minutes inside a retreat schedule or a full afternoon as its own workshop. The content should fit the time available, not the other way around.
Do you need to be a certified teacher to teach a class?
Not generally, though it depends on the subject; some skills and some settings do require a credential, so check what applies to what you're teaching and where. This isn't legal advice, so if you're unsure whether your subject needs a license or certification, check with a licensed professional or the relevant body in your field.
What's the difference between teaching a class and running a workshop?
A class is usually the teaching itself, one block of instruction with a clear thing people leave knowing or able to do. A workshop is the larger container it might sit inside, with its own structure, pacing and close. How to run a workshop people remember covers that larger container in full. ## Every guide in this section How to run a workshop people remember covers the shape of the hours around your class, once teaching is only part of what the session needs to do. Turning a workshop into a business picks up once a class or a workshop is repeating on a schedule and bringing in steady income. Back up to hosting experiences and workshops for the full picture. If teaching is heading toward a full course rather than a single class or session, how to add a retreat to your coaching business covers a related version of that step, building a bigger offering around what you already teach. ## Members' experiences Some of what members are already teaching, inside workshops, experiences and full retreats, is on members' trips. The Residency puts five days around the business behind what you teach, in person, January 14 to 18, 2027, at Lakemore in Traverse City. It's built for retreat hosts and experience hosts alike. You leave with your price and plan set and your founder's video filmed, the same work that sits behind a class people remember, done with Anna, Robert and Stacy across the table instead of on your own. See what you leave with.