@NeilMGrant ...
Hopefully this will help... the way I understand this is that let's say you had a "master" course where you built out a course. You then share that course (or a single resource) to Commons. You also make updates to this course as needed and then push out those updates to Commons, too. For your four "test" courses, you would want to enroll a "dummy" account...such as a fictitious instructor account, with the "Teacher" role. (If you wanted, you could have three other "dummy" accounts...enrolling them each in one of the sections, but I don't think that's completely necessary.) The "dummy" account would be the one to import your shared resource into one of the "test" courses. Then, leave the "dummy" account and return to your own account. Share the updated resource to Commons, and mark it that it's an update to a previously shared resource. Then...log back in as the "dummy" instructor. Go into Commons as that "dummy" instructor, and there should be something listed under that "Updates" tab.
I think what you're missing is that it's not really you who is pushing the update out to those four "test" courses. All you are doing is updating the resource in Commons...even if an instructor has already imported your resource from Commons into his/her own course. Commons allows the instructors to choose whether or not they want to apply that update to their own course(s). That is why, when you update a resource, you can provide revision notes to let people know what you changed and why you made the change. Instructors can review the updates on their own and then make an informed decision on whether or not it should be applied to their own course(s).
You would only see something listed in the "Updates" tab if you had imported content from Commons into one or more of your own courses that someone else had created...and then later updated. The "Updates" tab isn't telling you that you have updated a resource and that you can now push it out to the four "test" courses. That is ultimately up to the instructors who choose to use your shared resource in their own course(s).
This is all covered in: How do I view updates to resources I previously im... - Instructure Community - 1797.
I hope this helps to better explain how Commons works. Let me know if you have any questions...thanks!
