Canvas – Combining Sections into One Canvas Course

Instructors can combine multiple sections into a single course in Canvas. This is helpful when teaching numerous sections of the same content or a cross-listed course.

Note: You can only combine courses in which you are listed as an instructor; you cannot combine another instructor's course with your own. Make sure to combine sections before publishing the Canvas course. We also recommend combining your courses BEFORE adding course material. If there is an error when combining your courses, course content and activities set up in the original existing courses may be deleted once a course is combined. Any existing student activity (discussions/assignment submissions/grades) could also be affected, and combining courses after students have submitted work is not recommended.

If you have already added content to your course, we recommend creating a backup copy of your course content before combining courses (student submissions will not be backed up).

To make a backup copy:

1. Copy the course content from the official course(s) to a new course: How Do I Copy a Canvas Course?
2. Combine your official courses.
3. Copy content back into the official course (if necessary): How do I import content from another Canvas course?

Note: Please verify each combined section's start and end dates; individual section start and end dates are maintained, even after combining courses.

Combining courses in Canvas

Video: How to Combine Courses in Canvas

1. Navigate to the main lecture/lab course and copy the course ID number, which is the last number in the URL for the course, e.g., https://canvas.ou.edu/courses/6199 (6199 is the course ID number).
2. Next, navigate to the course you want to combine with the main course.
   1. For example, if you want to combine sections 001 and 002 of a course, copy the course ID from section 001 and navigate to section 002. Click Settings on the bottom left side.
3. Select the Sections tab.
4. Under Course Sections, click on the name of the section.
5. From the right side menu, click on Cross-List this Section.
6. In the pop-up box, paste the course ID number you copied from step 1 in the box next to ‘Or Enter the Course’s ID:’, then click Enter or in any white space next to the box. Under Selected Course, verify that the main course title has populated and is what you wanted.
7. Click Cross-List This Section.
8. Repeat steps 2-6 for each additional section.
9. When you enter the main course and click Sections (under Settings), you should see the combined sections.

To restrict TAs/students to only having the ability to view their section in the course

9. After the courses are combined, click on People in the navigation bar.
10. Click on the name of the user you would like to edit.
11. A sidebar with user details will appear. Click the user’s name again in the sidebar to bring up the full details page.
12. Next to Privileges, click the link “Limit this user to only see fellow section users”. This will allow the user only to view those in their assigned course section(s).