This documentation is also available via a How to Quickstart video:

You must publish the course

A course will not be available to students until published and the first date of term by default. (This can be changed - see below.) Unpublished courses will have this warning at the top of their home page:

Click Publish located on the right hand side of your screen.

You will see the following:

Published will now appear in green under course status. The course is now visible to students.

By default courses open to students the first day of term

However your course must be published for your course to open. If you want to open your course earlier or later, you can change the Start date by following the instructions in Personalizing your course.

Reasons students can't see your course:

"Users can only participate in the course between these dates" is set.

If the term start and end dates are incorrectly set and the option "Users can only participate in the course between these dates" is checked, students might not be able to access the course.

1. Click on Settings in the course navigation menu to the left

2. Under the Course Details tab, check that the dates are correct (there might not be an end date) and that Users can only participate in the course between these dates is unchecked.

3. Click Update Course Details if you made any changes.

The course material is locked.

Course material can be locked by either manually locking it (modules, files) or by setting "Available from" and "Until" dates (assignments, discussions, quizzes).

Check whether modules are locked

Modules can be locked manually or have rules set to unlock them automatically.

1. Click on Modules in the course navigation menu to the left.

2. Click on the gear icon to the far right of the module header bar, then click Edit.

3. Check the module details to see if the module is locked or has prerequisites that must be completed before students can access the module.

4. Click Update Module if you made any changes, otherwise click Cancel.

Check whether Files are locked

Files can be manually locked from the Files section.

1. Click on Files in the course navigation menu to the left.

2. Locked files and folders will be indicated by a lock on the file icon

3. To unlock a file or folder, click the open lock icon to the right of it

Check "Available from" and "Until" dates

Assignments can be locked by setting "Available from" and "Until" dates.

1. Click on Assignments in the course navigation menu to the left.

2. Click on the assignment name to see its details

3. The Available from and Until dates set when the students can access the assignment

4. To change the dates, click on the Edit button to the right

5. Change or remove the dates to allow students to access the assignment

6. Click Update Assignment at the bottom to save your changes

Checking these dates also works the same way in discussions and quizzes. 

The course material is unpublished

Course material can be published/unpublished by selecting the publish/unpublish button. (modules, pages, assignments, discussions, quizzes). The green icon [1] means the material is published, and grey [2] is unpublished.

Similarly, if you enter any of these items individually (modules, pages, assignments, discussions, quizzes), there will be a green/grey button at the top indicating whether it is published or not.