What is a Canvas Sandbox and how can I get one?
Canvas: What is a Sandbox, and how can I get one? A sandbox is a Canvas course with no enrollment.
What is a Sandbox?
A sandbox is a Canvas course with no enrollment. Sandboxes allow you the creative freedom to learn how Canvas works, to try out different tools and features, and to template courses or work on course design when you have time instead of waiting for the course shells to become available for the semester. Note: that sandboxes are only meant for instructors and not students, so sandboxes are not tied to any sort of enrollment.
You might already have a Sandbox
Did you check your "All courses" area for sandboxes? Most Mt. SAC faculty already have several sandboxes. If you have worked here since we migrated to Canvas in 2016, you probably do too, but you may not know it yet! They may not be on your dashboard. To check if you already have sandboxes:
- Log into Canvas
- Click on "Courses" just underneath "Dashboard" on the left (gray) global navigation menu.
- Scroll to bottom and click "All courses." This goes to a list of all courses associated with your Mt. SAC Canvas account.
- If you have sandboxes you will see them there. Click on the star to the left of the Sandbox to "favorite" it so it appears on your dashboard
Requesting a Sandbox (or a few)
To request a Canvas sandbox, please submit an IT Help Desk ticket using the self-service portal at https://helpdesk.mtsac.edu.
- Visit https://helpdesk.mtsac.edu and login with your Mt. SAC employee email and password.
- Click on the card "Request a service" to access the service catalog.
- In the service catalog, you can use the search feature to find "sandbox" or you can click on the category "Classroom and Lab" and then select "Canvas Sandbox Request."
Fun Fact: You Can Copy Content from Sandboxes into Other Course Shells
- It is simple to move some or all materials that you create in a sandbox to another course. It works the same way whether you are moving content from a sandbox into a CRN course shell or if you are moving content from past courses into an active course. You go to the course where you want content to end up, and go to Settings. Then in the right side menu, select "Import Course Content" and under Content Type select "Copy a Canvas Course." Here are the full instructions for copying content with screenshots.
Fun Fact: You Can Reset Sandboxes (Empty Content)
- You can also blank out the contents in any course including sandboxes. This will permanently remove all content in the course shell including any files or images that were added. It will also reset the navigation to the default mode. It will not affect enrollment. Here are the full instructions on resetting your sandbox course to an empty state.
- Since you always have access to all of your past courses, if you have moved sandbox material into a live course, you may want to reset course content and reuse the sandbox. However, you don't have to do this if you prefer to keep your sandbox copy and your live CRN version as well.