Emory's LibGuide on LibGuides: Best Practices & Guidelines for Creating and Maintaining LibGuides

There are two ways to embed LibGuides into courses in Canvas. The simplest is to use what Springshare calls the "Automagic" method. This links an individual guide to an individual class. The other method is manual, and allows instructors to embed any guide into any class.

Automagic Method

Embedding a LibGuide into a Canvas class this way requires the librarian and faculty member to work together. You need to add some custom metadata to your guide to connect it to the class.

1. In LibGuides, open the guide you wish to embed in Canvas.
2. Near the top-right corner of the guide, click the gear symbol from the toolbar.
3. Choose Guide Metadata from the drop-down menu that appears. It should be the first option.
4. A small pop-up window will appear. The default metadata view is the Dublin Core information, which you can see on the tabs directly above the metadata. Select the tab to the right of Dublin Core, which is labeled Custom Metadata.
5. On the next page, you'll see an empty table. In the Name column, click the blue text, "Empty." It has a dotted underline:

For the Name field, enter "lti" (that's LTI in all lower-case letters). Enter this for all of your courses. Click the blue checkmark to save the Name.

You will now see the value Empty under the Value column for this item. Click the blue dotted Empty link to enter the value for your Canvas course:

Click the blue checkmark to save. Once that's done, you can now click the blue Close button at the bottom of the box.

Using the specific Canvas code is what allows the guide to show up in a specific Canvas course automatically. You have completed all of the LibGuides configuration needed to embed it in Canvas. If you need the course code, either your faculty member should provide that, or if you have Librarian access to the course, you should be able to acquire it yourself.

Finding the Course Code

To acquire the course code from a Canvas course:

1. On the course's home page, choose Settings from the Course Navigation menu
2. Find the SIS ID field; that's the value you need to add to the LibGuide's custom metadata. See image below

Once that has been done, students will see it when they choose the Library Research Guides link in the Course Navigation page.

Now that you have this information, click on "Empty" under "Value," and paste the course code in:

The only piece remaining is to add the Library Research Guide to the Canvas course's left navigation. First, go to the course's Settings, and choose the navigation tab. There, you should see the left-navigation setup:

Below this section is another called "Drag items here to hide them from students." Find the "Library Research Guide" option in this list. Click on it, and drag it to the list of items visible in the left navigation. Finally, scroll to the bottom of the settings and click the Save button. When the page refreshes, you should see the Library Course Guide in the left navigation menu, and the students will be able to access it.

Jenn Sutcliffe of TLT offered two workshops in October 2019 re. new Canvas features for librarians and created the handout above, "Canvas Tips for Librarians."

If you have further questions about using Canvas, see the training resources at classes.emory.edu or make an appointment for one-on-one help. 

Finding Shared Content in Canvas

1. After logging in, click on the Account button.

2. Select Shared Content

3. The Getting Library Materials Fall 2020 quiz should appear here. If not, contact Lori Jahnke.