Copy content into multiple courses at once

[seth]

  This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

  Idea will be open for vote May 5th, 2015 - August 5th, 2015  Learn more about voting...

As an instructor, I'd like to copy content from a single course to multiple other courses at one time. I'd like to be able to go to the course in which the content now resides, select items to copy, and then select one or multiple courses into which to copy the content. This would help me at the beginning of terms as, for instance, I copy content from a "master" course where I've developed my content into multiple Canvas courses, because my institution places each section of a given academic course into separate Canvas courses.

transferred from the old Community

Originally posted by: Chris Long

Special thanks for contributions from: Kat Mulvey, Sandy McArthur, Barb Miltner, Betsy Walker

  Comments from Instructure

May 2016 Update

From Kate McGee, Commons Product Manager

I'm excited to announce as of last week, we’ve updated the functionality in Commons to allow users to import content into multiple courses at once.

Here is how it's done:

• Share the course you want to copy to Commons (publicly, institutionally, or privately)
• You should be able to select any/all of the courses by check-marking the course(s) to which you want to import.
• On the resource detail page, Click "Import into Course"

More details in this guide: https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-2005

This was a request from the community. Your feedback is essential to our product's continued improvement. Thank you so much to all of you!

Preview of User Interface:

November 2015 update

I may be biased, but I'm pretty sure we have the most amazing Community of users ever!  We appreciate all of the energy and effort that everyone of you put into a feature idea, and we appreciate even more when you keep returning to tell us how to make it better.

When Commons was released we knew that it would be a possible solution for some users, but we also acknowledge that it is not the ideal user experience for many.  For this very reason, we would like to revert this idea from complete and mark it as "under consideration" while we work toward a better option!  Please follow and bookmark this idea to receive updates as they are available!

For more information on the feature idea stages please reference How does the voting process work for feature ideas?

July response from Kate McGee

Greetings All!

Commons is now available and provides the ability to import content into more than one course from a simple Commons import menu.

Here is how it's done:

• Share the course you want to copy to Commons (publicly, institutionally, or privately)
• On the resource detail page, Click "Import into Course"
• Select your course from the dropdown
• Repeat the "Import into Course" for each course you want to content copied into

Note: that you won't be able to copy multiple versions of a resource into one course without replacing the initial resource, at least not yet

Chris Long because you were the original poster in the old community, will you give this a try and let us know if it meets your needs!?

[kmcgee]

I'm excited to announce as of last week, we’ve updated the functionality in Commons to allow users to import content into multiple courses at once.

Here is how it's done:

•    Share the course you want to copy to Commons (publicly, institutionally, or privately)

•    You should be able to select any/all of the courses by check-marking the course(s) to which you want to import.

•    On the resource detail page, Click "Import into Course"

More details in this guide: https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-2005

This was a request from the community. Your feedback is essential to our product's continued improvement. Thank you so much to all of you!

Preview of User Interface:

[aanthony]

Using Commons is fine if you don't have specific settings you want transferred.  If I want to import a quiz that I've set to allow multiple retakes, average the scores, and shuffle answers, for example, those settings will not be imported with the quiz through Commons.  We need something that combines the ease of importing into multiple courses that we see from Commons and the completeness of importing through the settings menu on the individual courses.

[tyema]

I agree that we need to be able to include the course settings in the copy.  Specifically the order and availability of items in navigation.  We are working on coming up with a few templates that we want to have our faculty use so that all the courses have a similar look and feel.  That includes what should or shouldn't be hidden in the course navigation and perhaps a few custom links.

We would also like to be able to copy a basic template into every course before we make the courses available to faculty for updating.  It looks like I would need to be enrolled in all 5000+ courses in order to copy the content using Commons.

[clong]

While the May 2016 Canvas Commons Update satisfies the letter of the original feature idea I requested, I don't think this is helpful to many of the users who added comments to the original idea and clarified how they wanted to use this. The use case given by many users in the follow-up comments (including me, the idea originator) was for creating content on the fly and copying it to multiple classes at once. Let's take a look at how this is accomplished with the May 2016 update.

From Deactivated user​'s May 2016 update:

•    Share the course you want to copy to Commons (publicly, institutionally, or privately)

•    You should be able to select any/all of the courses by check-marking the course(s) to which you want to import.

•    On the resource detail page, Click "Import into Course"

So want I wanted to see is how many clicks would it take and what would the workflow be like if I wanted to create a new assignment in Course A and then copy it to Courses B & C. Here is what I came up with:

Create the assignment in Course A and adjust all the settings.

1. Click on Share to Commons [1 click]
2. Click on Who can use this resource boxes [1 click]
3. Enter Required Description [text entry]
4. Enter Required Tags [text entry]
5. Enter/Select Required Image [2 clicks]
6. Select Grades & Outcomes
7. Click Share [1 click]
8. Wait as long as 30 minutes for The shared Resource to process. (in most cases this doesn't take nearly that long)
9. Refresh Page or click on shared resource (assignment you just shared) [1 click]
10. Click on the boxes for Course B & D to copy it in there. [2 clicks]
11. Click import into Course button [1 click]
12. Go to Course A & B and move the Assignment out of Imported Assignments and into the correct assignment group. [6 clicks]
13. Edit all the copied Assignments Due dates, because they get sstripped out by Commmons. (click into each course, click on assignments, click on the Assignment click on due date, click update) that's 4 x 2 = 8 clicks just for that! [8 clicks]

By my count this process takes 23 clicks, 2 text entry fields , image selection and some waiting to accomplish. I think it would be a lot easier just to copy and paste the assignment descriptions in Course B and C or use a import from another course method (2 times)

Back when this feature idea was previously marked completed, I made a video to demonstrate what on the fly content copying looks like. Please see:  Adding Assignments to Multiple Classes in Google Classroom ​ By my count that process takes 2 extra clicks and can be accomplished in less than a second. No text entry, image selection or waiting required.

In closing, I would like to request that you please consider making a . I appreciate that there has been progress made that gets us closer but we would like you to shoot for something way more Awesome! 

[biray]

Commons Product Manager Kate McGee is working on gathering more information around master courses in Commons. Her team is "looking for insight into Master Course needs and usage and would appreciate your participate where applicable." Click to complete the Master Course Survey (which should only take about 5 minutes to complete).

(NOTE: This survey will close on Friday 8/13 @ 5pm MST.)

[Stef_retired]

For anyone interested in this topic, be sure to RSVP to the CanvasLIVE event Ask Me Anything: Kate McGee, Product Manager, Commons+Content, which is coming up on Thursday, October 20, 2016. Kate is going to be answering questions about Canvas Commons, master courses, templates, and the content authoring tools in Canvas--and, well, anything! If you’re interested, but your schedule doesn’t allow you to attend in real time, RSVP "no" or "maybe" so you can receive any post-event updates.

[Renee_Carney]

Thank you to kbeimfohr for submitting this idea, as well as,  @clong ​,  @mlattke ​,  @cataan ​, james66058​, lawrence_wirth​,  @kristin_bayless ​,  @bjholt ​,  @kedgecomb ​,  @kmooberry ​, julie.king​, elise.smith​,  @cbuie ​, dhinkel​,  @kona ​,  @canvas_admin ​,  @pkreemer ​,  @kmeeusen ​,  @sadenniston ​, thayerm​ & tyema for your contributions. Your investment in this idea helped refine a feature which is now part of Canvas!

[Stef_retired]

For anyone interested in this topic, be sure to RSVP to the CanvasLIVE event Quick Demo: 5 Ways to Course Copy, which is coming up this Thursday, November 3, 2016. RSVP "Yes" if you plan to attend--and if you’re interested, but your schedule doesn’t allow you to attend in real time, RSVP "No" or "Maybe" to receive any post-event updates.

[Renee_Carney]

Check out Canvas Release: Blueprint Courses in the Canvas Beta Release Notes (2017-06-12).  There are solutions in this new feature that apply to this feature idea!