Claude Certified Architect – Foundations – Study Plan

Topics

• Claude model family (Haiku, Sonnet, Opus) – capabilities, use cases, cost
• Claude API basics (authentication, messages endpoint, streaming)
• System prompts and message roles
• Responsible AI principles (Constitutional AI, refusal handling)

Activities

• Create an Anthropic account and obtain an API key.
• Make your first API call (Python or curl) with a simple prompt.
• Take ExamOS Rookie mode quiz (30 questions) on Claude fundamentals.

Topics

• Effective prompt structure (instructions, context, examples)
• Chain‑of‑thought and few‑shot prompting
• Claude’s response length and temperature tuning
• Handling refusals and edge cases

Activities

• Write prompts that produce structured JSON output.
• Experiment with temperature (0 to 1) and max_tokens.
• Take ExamOS Challenger mode quiz on Prompt Engineering.

Topics

• Defining tools (JSON schema, descriptions)
• Tool choice (auto, required, specific tool)
• Processing tool calls and returning results
• Multi‑step tool interactions

Activities

• Build a Claude agent that can query a weather API.
• Handle tool call loops and error conditions.
• Take ExamOS Challenger mode quiz on Tool Use.

Topics

• Managing long conversations (trimming, summarisation)
• Claude’s context window (200K tokens)
• Handling ambiguous inputs and requesting clarification
• Retry strategies and error recovery

Activities

• Simulate a long conversation that exceeds context limits; implement truncation.
• Take ExamOS Challenger mode quiz on Context Management.
• Repeat until 2 consecutive passes.

Topics

• Constitutional AI principles (helpful, honest, harmless)
• Refusal patterns and when they occur
• Evaluating Claude outputs (accuracy, coherence, safety)
• Logging and monitoring API usage

Activities

• Review Anthropic’s safety guidelines and refusal examples.
• Set up logging for API requests/responses.
• Take ExamOS Challenger mode quiz on Safety & Evaluation.

Topics

• Full syllabus review
• Architecture design for Claude‑powered systems

Activities

• Take ExamOS Legend mode full quizzes (at least 3).
• Review every incorrect answer; study the explanation.
• Focus on weak domains using targeted quizzes (premium “Focus mode”).
• Once you pass Legend mode twice in a row, schedule your real exam.