Preparing for a New Term

While courses will start with a general layout and template available, there are still a number of different settings and items you need to set up to fit your course. These might include:

Grading Scheme
Assignment groups
Weighted groups
More personalized home page with links
Personalized pages
Syllabus

Creating a course shell is one way to speed up the process of setting up new courses and ensure fidelity from term to term.

Creating a Course Shell (vs a Sandbox)

A course shell will have more basic items available and would be the first thing you import into your new course. You will want items that are content-based such as assignments and modules to be stored in a separate place, like a sandbox course. There you would have them set with NO due date and UNPUBLISHED so they are ready to transfer to your courses as needed.

The purpose of a shell is to help get your course set up quickly and efficiently at the beginning of a new term.

How should you get your course shell ready?

Choose a course from the 2021-2022 school year (such as Trimester 1 or Semester 1). It should be a course that has "School Resources" and that you have worked in recently to be an "ideal" course.

Open the settings and choose "Copy this course" from the right menu.

Rename the course and choose "select specific content."

course shell_1.png

Specific content could include:

Course settings (this will pull grading scheme, having grade total available, visibility, etc.)
Syllabus
Pages
- Home page (Welcome)
- Get to know you
- Other pages you use in every course for initial set up or that are linked from your home page or navigation
Optional: External tools
Optional: Rubrics
Optional: Outcomes

course shell_2.png

course shell_4.png

Once the copy is complete, you will have a new course. Fine-tune this course as needed and use it to copy into your Skyward-created courses and maintain your chosen settings.

You will notice that...

Your home page buttons linked to course-based links (assignments and modules) will link within your new course correctly.
Your home page (welcome) is set as your front page (if not, please look at pages, all pages and choose your newly imported welcome as your front page).
Your settings such as course grade scheme and allow grade total will be set
Your syllabus has been copied over
Your course navigation has transferred over
You have external tools as selected
Outcomes you selected are available
Rubrics you have created are available

You may choose to import over more content as preferred but remember this is more of a shell of how your course functions rather than the content.

You will still need to add or set the following:

Assignment groups and weights
Missing and Late policies

How is the Course Shell different than my Sandbox?

Differences between a Course Shell and Sandbox
Course Shell	Sandbox
Used for initial copy of course details, settings, and more static information	Used to store course content and materials (ex. assignments, quizzes, and modules)
Would be specific to each teacher (home page message, about me page)	Might be shared with other teachers for collaboration
Can use for each new term	Would either be term-based or would move content by term as needed
Will not have assignments	Will house unpublished and non-dated assignments

See it in Action