About the Course Setup Wizard for Canvas

On this page:

Overview
Use the Course Setup Wizard

Overview

The Course Setup Wizard, collaboratively developed by the UITS eLearning Services and LMS Development teams based on faculty feedback, is designed to help instructors through some of the common processes involved in building new courses. Use the wizard for help importing content from another course, adding a template, or adding the IU Home Page to your course.

Note:

The Course Setup Wizard is available only in unpublished Canvas courses and can be completed only once per course; if you want to start over with a different choice, you must reset the course first. For more on resetting course content, see Reset your Canvas course content and settings.

Important:

If you ordered any course materials (a stand-alone eText, publisher courseware, or a digital learning tool) through the IU eTexts initiative, and those materials have been deployed to your Canvas site, resetting your course will disable the links to them. You may re-enable the stand-alone eText link for Engage on your own. You must request a re-enable of the courseware or digital learning tools link. There is no guarantee how fast this can be done.

Use the Course Setup Wizard

Instructors, teaching assistants, designers, and those with administrative privileges in a course can access the Course Setup Wizard. A pop-up will prompt you to start the wizard when you open an unpublished course. (You'll have the option to permanently dismiss the pop-up in the current course or all courses.) You also can start the wizard from the sidebar on the course's Settings page.

After launching the wizard, select one of the three options on the main screen, and then follow the on-screen instructions. More information about each option is provided below.

Import content from another Canvas course

This option guides you through the steps of importing content from another course.

You will first be prompted to select a course from which to import. Your choices will include all courses in which you are enrolled as a teacher, designer, or teaching assistant.

After making your selection, you can choose to import the entire course (all content and settings) or select specific content to import. If you are importing from a Blueprint course, you can choose to import the entire course and the Blueprint settings.

Later, you'll be asked whether you want to keep, modify, or remove all dates for events and assignments. If choosing to modify dates, it is important to know the dates of the first and last day of class for the new course and for the course from which you are importing. Providing this information will provide the best results for date adjustments.

Note:

Alternatively, you can use the native Canvas import tool to import content from another Canvas course; on your course's Settings page, select Import Course Content. For more, see Import Canvas content from a previous semester course.

Import the customizable IU course template or another template

Templates provide a starting point for creating content for your course. They consist of any combination of settings, instructional content, and branding elements. Choosing this option lets you view all templates available to you based on the location of your course in the Canvas academic hierarchy, including the IU Course Template.

Note:

Alternatively, to apply a template to your Canvas course, on your course's Settings page, select Apply Course Template. For more, see:

Add a professionally designed home page

The IU Home Page is an attractive and accessible Canvas page with content that you can customize or replace with your own text.

To add the IU Home Page to your course, use the Course Setup Wizard or launch the Apply Course Template tool on the Settings page. For more, see Apply a template to your Canvas course.

Note:

Alternatively, to change the course Home page without using the wizard, see How do I change the Course Home Page?