[ARCHIVED] Is it possible to create one course and share it with colleagues? Like in google classroom.

[angelica_jaureg]

My department and I have decided to align. We will all be teaching the same thing. We will be working collaboratively to construct our course on canvas. In effort to save time and work smarter, is there a way to create one course and share it so we can each copy and paste into our canvas. 

[rmurchshafer · Accepted solution]

Angelica,

There are a few options to think about, some which would require assistance from a Canvas admin at your school.

BluePrint - For what you describe with a consistent curriculum using BluePrint might be ideal but does require some set up and assistance from an Admin.  Essentially you create a Master (blueprint) course with the content, associate it with the courses being used to teach, and it copies all content to them.  It also allows you to make changes in the blueprint course and sync those changes to the associated courses.  A great feature of BluePrint is that it's driven by someone in charge.  Content is copied to the courses without individual instructors needing to do anything to make it the content move happen.  Here is an overview video from an Admin perspective about how BluePrint works.  

Commons - Commons allows people to share entire courses or parts of courses to Commons, and you can specify who gets access to import that content.  The "who" can be the world, just your school, or a group of people at your school.  To use the Group of feature option an admin would need to establish that group.  Once you add content to Commons any of the people who have access can import that content into their course.  It's a great way to manage content that is optional.  Meaning that the instructor is in charge of whether they import content or not and they still maintain full control of their courses.  Here is an overview video meant for instructors  

Shared course - This idea is fairly simple.  You create an extra course where you develop content and have all of the teachers enrolled in it with teacher access.  Since everyone has teacher access they all have the ability to import the entire course or selected pieces of it into their own courses.  It's fairly simple to do but does require some trust since each teacher has access to potentially change or edit materials in that main course with the content.  Here is the basic guide for how instructors would import content from this course into their own How do I copy content from another Canvas course using the Course Import tool? 

Direct Share - This is a somewhat new feature which may or may not be turned on yet in your instance of Canvas.  It only works for Pages, Quizzes, Assignment and Discussions, but makes it easy for one instructor to share these items with another instructor even when they don't both have access to a common course.  The basic idea is that for an Assignment, you Share it with an individual or group of individuals and then they have access to import that content into any of their courses.  I don't think this is ideal for you since it sounds like you will have much more than just individual items, but wanted to include it still because it is useful.  Here is a quick guide about how to use it for Assignments, but for the other options (quiz, page, etc) is the same process.  https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-18384-41521186119 

I probably overdid the options here but hope it helps you to figure out what is going to work best in your situation.

Good luck, and kudos on working together to align course content with your colleagues.  

Rick