How do I copy content from one course to another within Moodle?

Moodle Course Reuse – Backup, Restore, and Import

This page contains instructions on how to transfer information from a previous course to a new one. If you are copying courses from previous academic years, you may find notable differences in how you backup courses from Moodle archive servers and restore those courses to the current Moodle server.  This is because of significant differences between the current Moodle server version (Moodle 4.5), compared with previous Moodle versions on our archive servers.

If the course you are copying is from Fall 2024 or later, skip to the instructions below for Importing a Course.

If the course you are copying is from Fall 2021 to Spring 2024, first backup the old course and then restore it to the new course.  Note: If your back up file is larger than 250 MB, please contact hc-techlearn@haverford.edu. 

For older courses, please contact hc-techlearn@haverford.edu. We will find and restore old materials in compliance with our Moodle Long Term Archive/Retention Policy, stated below.

 Moodle Long Term Archive/Retention Policy.

  • Moodle courses taught in the previous three years will be available for you to review, backup, and restore into your current courses — although they may not be on the current Moodle server.
  • Course materials on Moodle taught four to eight years ago will be available upon request from IITS, but may take up to a week to restore.
  • Courses taught more than eight years ago will be deleted and no longer available from IITS. We recommend you keep your own archives of any materials you want to keep, in addition to the materials kept by IITS.

A Note to Off-Campus Users

To review or copy Moodle materials from courses in previous academic years, you must now either be physically on the Haverford, Bryn Mawr, or Swarthmore campuses OR use VPN software for your network access. IITS limits access to these servers because they are no longer eligible for security updates.

VPN is software that allows your remote network connection to emulate being on campus. If you have any questions about VPN, please see our VPN instructions or contact the ProDesk.

 

Backup the original course information

  1. Select the old course you want to archive or copy into your new course site. You may need to use VPN and look on a Moodle archive server to find your course via the Moodlegroups/Moodle archives link at the top of the current Moodle course site.
    Illustration of Moodle top menu bar, with links to Moodle archive servers
  2. Log into the Moodle server for the appropriate academic year and open the course you wish to backup or copy.
  3. Backup your original course — the one with your content. Depending upon the Moodle version, you may find the backup option in different places.
    1. For courses taught in Fall 2023 or Spring 2024:
      1. From the top menu bar, select More → Course Reuse menu.
      2. Select the Backup option from that menu.
        Illustration showing where to find the backup option in F23 and later courses
         
    2. For Fall 2022 and earlier, the option is found under the course administration gear icon (Gear icon, indicating settings menu) in the top right corner of your course.
      Illustration of course backup menu 
  4. You will be prompted to select what you want to include in the backup or just keep the defaults and click Continue. NOTE: User data and grades will NOT be included in the backup. If you need to keep grade information, you can export grades via the grade book.
  5. Click Continue. Note: The default file name includes the name of your course and the time and date of the backup.
  6. Click Perform this backup at the bottom of the page.
  7. The next page will say “The backup file was successfully created.”  Click Continue again.
    illustration of screen saying the backup was successful
  8. You should now see the backup in your private backup area. (If you do not see a screen similar to the one illustrated below, click on the Restore link in the course administration block.) Click the link to download and save as desired in your local files.
    illustration showing how to download archive file created by the backup

Restore course information from a backup .mbz file

Once you downloaded the backup archive, you can restore it to your current course.

  1. From the More menu, located below your course name, select Course Reuse.
    illustration of "Course reuse" option at the bottom of the "More" menu.
  2. Select the Restore option.
    Illustration of Restore option in the drop-down menu
  3. Upload or select the .mbz backup of the course you want to restore. If your file is larger than 250 MB, contact hc-techlearn@haverford.edu for help.
    illustration showing where to upload the archive you wish to restore.
  4. Click Restore. You will see a series of screens, starting with a verification of the items in your backup file. Scroll down and Continue.
  5. Select the restore options to merge your content into the current course. Continue.
    select the option, "merge the backup coure into this course"
  6. You will be prompted with several more screens. Select desired options, and click next until your restore is complete.

Import course information from a previous course taught since Fall 2024

Note: You must have the role of course builder, course support, or teacher in both the original and destination course sites to do this.

  1. From the More menu, located below your course name, select Course Reuse.
    illustration of "Course reuse" option at the bottom of the "More" menu.
  2. Select the Import option.
    illustration showing Moodle import option in the the drop-down menu
  3. Select the course that you want to import and then click the Continue button. If you have a lot of courses, you can use the search option to find the right one.

    Illustration of screen where you will select desired course
    Pro-Tip: If you have a lot of sections or courses with similar names, it is helpful to search from your Moodle Courses page. Once you find the original course you want, paste that course ID into the import search.
  4. You will be prompted with several more screens. Select desired options, and click next until your import is complete.
  5. You should now see the imported materials in the new course.
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