Reorder your course content

Content is delivered in the order it appears on the course page, top to bottom. That order is the course — it decides what arrives, and in what sequence. On a course with tracks, the main path and each track have their own order.

Changing the order

Drag an item to where you want it. The order saves as you leave it, and every item holds a distinct position.

On a course with tracks, you reorder one track at a time, a drag that crosses into another track is refused. To move content onto another track, or back to the main path, use Move to on its row. It lands at the end of that track.

Some moves are refused

A track has to rejoin the course after the content that sends learners onto it — otherwise learners would loop straight back onto the same track. Any move that would break that is refused, whether it's a drag, a Move to, or a change to the track itself. Move the rejoin point, or the content that routes, first.

Waiting periods move with the position, not the item

Each item's waiting period counts from the item before it. So moving something changes the gap it inherits, and the gap the item after it now waits through.

Move a lesson with a three-day wait so it follows a quiz, and it now arrives three days after that quiz, not three days after whatever it used to follow. Check the waiting periods after any reshuffle, especially on the item you moved and the one that took its place.

Two items are special cases. The item at the top of the course counts from the moment someone enrolls, so it should almost always be set to 0. And the first item on a track counts from the content that sent the learner onto it.

Settle the order before you enroll anyone

Reordering an empty course costs nothing. Reordering one with learners partway through it is where the surprises are - see below.

Reordering a course that already has learners

A learner's progress is a position within the path they are on — the main path or a track — not a list of things they have seen. When one item finishes, the course looks for the next item below it and sends that.

Moving content past a learner changes what they receive

Move an item down, past somebody's current position, and they will receive it again, the course sees something below them that has not been sent from where they now stand.

Move an item up, behind their position, and they will never receive it. The course only ever looks forwards.

Neither is announced, and neither shows up on the course page. The further through a course your learners are, the more a reshuffle affects them.

Move to counts as a move. Moving content to the end of another track can repeat it for learners on that track who already received it where it used to be.

Changing a running course safely

You can still improve a course that people are taking. Some changes are safe and some are not.

Change	Effect on learners already enrolled
Editing an item's content	Safe. Anyone who has not reached it gets the new version.
Adding an item at the end	Safe. Everyone reaches it in turn.
Adding an item in the middle	Only reaches learners who have not passed that point yet.
Moving an existing item	Can repeat or skip content for learners mid-course.
Unpublishing an item	Safe. It stops being delivered and everyone continues to the item after it.
Moving an item to another track	Only reaches learners on that track who haven't reached its end, which can include people who already received it.
Unpublishing a quiz or decision point with routing rules	Its rules stop routing anyone. Learners step straight past it and stay on their current path.

If a course needs real restructuring and has learners partway through it, the cleaner move is to leave it alone and build the new version as a separate course. Disable the old one so nobody new joins, and let the people already in it finish the course they signed up for.

Removing something

An item that has reached any learner cannot be deleted, it would take their history with it and break the chain that decides what they receive next.

Unpublish it instead. It stops going out to anyone new, and everybody currently mid-course carries on to the item after it.