title_body: Is there an open-source set of topics and vocabulary for making a language tutorial?
upvoted_answer: The Fundamento de Esperanto was published in 1905, so as far as I know it's in the public domain everywhere. It's one of the foundational documents of Esperanto, containing a short grammar description, a dictionary of thousands of words, and crucially a book of exercises (called the ekzercaro).
  The ekzercaro fits what you're asking for. It is divided into sections, and every section after section 4 contains sample sentences and new vocabulary items. For example, this is one of the sentences in section 5:
  
  Leono estas besto.
  
  And these are the English definitions of the terms introduced in that sentence.
  
  leono lion
  esti be
  as ending of the present tense in verbs
  besto beast
  
  Some of the designs of this course may or may not be suitable for your needs. For one thing, the ekzerzaro does not aim to have a very complete vocabulary because it is assumed that you will check the dictionary for other words you used. That means that the exercises do not teach you the word for &quot;cat&quot; even though they teach the word for lion very quickly.
  Some sections are paragraphs to read. My favorite thing about this exercise book is that it contains a short story about a fairy interspersed throughout it. Section 27 is a discussion of Esperanto grammar written in Esperanto, which will probably have to be completely rewritten for your language.
  You'll have to make adaptations depending on your language and culture. If you use these exercises to teach contemporary American English, you'll have to adapt to the ways the world has changed in the last century. For example, early on, there is is a sentence about hitting a student, and I am thankful that that is not a typical part of my country's culture anymore.