Dividing a Course into Two Courses

Question

A teacher needs to separate their Canvas course into two sections—one for the first block and the other for the second block.  The assignments are all identical.  How can I do this and still have the assignments move with the students and remain accurate within our SIS (Skyward)?

Hildi_Pardo · Accepted Answer

Hi @Adam2025

In our district, teachers who teach more than one section (period) of a course, receive a course with multiple sections.  This is how I explain it to new teachers in a introductory overview:

For every course you are assigned in Synergy (with student enrollments) a Canvas course is created with sections (periods) and enrollments. Do not manually add students to courses - if you have a new student, please allow 24 hours for the sync between Synergy and Canvas.

Multiple Sections (periods) in one Course:

If you teach more than one section of a course, all those sections/periods will be enrolled in one course.  Teachers can leverage Sections for differentiating assignments, due dates, announcements, and filtering the gradebook.

If you teach more than one subject, there will be a Canvas course for each subject. Example: If you teach 2 sections of Geometry and 3 sections of Algebra, you will have one Canvas course for Geometry and another for Algebra.

Sometimes we have teachers ask to split their sections into different courses and that it my opportunity to show them to power of Sections.   Maintaining one course is far easier and more efficient than maintaining two courses, especially if the assignments are identical.    Using Sections, you can create ONE Assignment but assign it to each section with different Due Dates (Canvas Guide).

Please know that if you decide you still want to separate out a section to a new course, you may need a Canvas Admin to do it for you, AND you will "lose" all those students assignments and grades when you move them.  There is not a way to retain their submissions and grades if you move them to a new course.

I hope this helps!