What does it mean to join Canvas course sections?
Joining course sections allows two or more sections of a course to be taught using a single Canvas course “shell.” For example, if you are teaching COR-310-03, -04, and -05, you can request to combine all three sections into a single Canvas course. The title of the new course will be COR-310-03/04/05, and students from each section will be enrolled in the new course shell together.
What are the advantages to joining multiple sections?
Since multiple sections can be taught from a single Canvas course shell, there is one point of administration instead of two or more. This can be a big time saver. Instructors are able to upload a file or create a new assignment once instead of multiple times. Assignments can have unique due dates for each section if necessary. There’s also a single gradebook where instructors will enter grades. Students remain identifiable by their section in the roster and in the gradebook.
What are the disadvantages to joining sections?
There are a few caveats to joining sections. First, all students are now enrolled in the same Canvas course, which allows them to interact with one another even if they are in different classes. Second, joining sections is not recommended if you plan to adapt content to each section individually. Lastly, some instructors find that managing one Canvas course with a large number of students more difficult than managing separate Canvas courses with smaller enrollments.
Please note: Once sections are joined, we are unable to decouple those sections.
How do I request that my sections become joined?
To join your course sections , you must email your request to clt@champlain.edu at least one week (five business days) prior to the first day of the semester. We are unable to join sections after students have been enrolled in the Canvas courses.
In your request, please:
- Include the course codes or the URLs/links to the courses you wish to join.
- Identify which Canvas course to preserve (if they already have some content in Canvas).
Please note: You should make your request prior to uploading or copying any content into your Canvas course since joining sections will not merge the content from multiple sections (content from only one section will be preserved).