Sharing Canvas course materials

Sharing course materials through Canvas can be a meaningful way to foster collaboration, ensure continuity, and support both colleagues and students. Whether you’re preparing to co-teach a course or helping a colleague transition into a new teaching assignment, it’s important to share responsibly and effectively. This guide outlines what to consider when sharing materials in Canvas, how to prepare your content, and the best methods for sharing with others.

Before sharing course materials, it is important to review the course and make sure the materials are ready for others to use. This helps preserve your original course’s structure and allows you to customize your materials without affecting past versions of the course.
As you prepare your course for sharing, keep the following in mind:

• Only include materials relevant to the course. Remove any personal notes, drafts of content, or term/student-specific information that may be inappropriate to share or unhelpful to another teacher. If you’re using links to Google Docs, double-check that sharing settings are open to “Anyone with the link” so that access isn’t restricted.
• Keep confidential information private. If your course includes recorded lectures where students can be seen or heard, such videos should be edited to remove or mask students’ participation before being shared. Student course data, such as enrollment, grades, discussion posts, or assignment submissions, as well as Zoom recordings automatically uploaded through the Canvas integration, will not be included in a course copy. Review the PSU Registrar’s page FERPA and Student Records Privacy FAQs for more information about FERPA and confidential student information.

When you’re sharing course materials with a colleague or other instructor, we recommend against adding a colleague to the live or completed Canvas shell with student data. Instead, choose one of the following sharing methods depending on your needs.

You can create a “sandbox” copy of the course to share with one or more colleagues. This will enable your colleague(s) to interact with your course without affecting the “live” Canvas shell or seeing confidential student course information. 

1. Create a new Canvas course (a “sandbox”)
2. Import the course you want to share into the sandbox
3. Add a user to a PSU Canvas course 

In order for the person you add to be able to copy elements of your course, you will need to assign them the role of Teacher, Guest Teacher, or Designer. Keep in mind that all of these roles will give them editing access and the ability to change content in the sandbox.

You can also export your course as a package file and share it via Google Drive. This is also a great way to archive content for your own purposes.

• How do I export a Canvas course?
• How do I import a Canvas course export package?
• How do I select specific content as part of a course import?

You can also share your entire course or just parts of it through Canvas Commons. This tool allows you to make your content available either to everyone at PSU or to the broader Canvas community. If you prefer a more controlled environment,  you can reach out to the Office of Academic Innovation (OAI) to help you set up a private departmental or team space within Commons to limit access.

• What is Canvas Commons?
• Canvas Commons Guides 

If you only want to share selected items—like a quiz, module, or assignment—you can use the “Send To…” feature in Canvas. This allows you to send individual course components directly to another instructor without sharing the entire course.

• How do I send an assignment to another instructor?
• How do I send a page to another instructor?
• How do I send a quiz to another instructor?
• How do I send a module to another instructor?
• How do I manage content shared to me from other users?