diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 0572dda73cb0096081fb019c41a20b486ef07865..08b47840c4c517abeb9f8c9a8c096dd6f3e4ba92 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -36,6 +36,8 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
 - The functions ``load_definition``, ``initialize_converters`` and ``load_converters`` are deprecated. Please use
   the functions ``load_definition``, ``initialize_converters`` and ``create_converter_registry`` from the scanner module
   instead.
+- The function ``start_crawling`` is deprecated. The function ``scan_structure_elements`` in the
+  scanner module mostly covers its functionality.
 
 ### Removed ###
 - The command line argument ``--prefix``. Use the new argument ``--remove-prefix`` instead.
diff --git a/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py b/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py
index 3dd1001172cfbebbd82bd50af8a4490fdcb0d3b7..7de1927516f2bb9a5532b1c7ac8dcd3df83a4efa 100644
--- a/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py
+++ b/src/caoscrawler/crawl.py
@@ -70,7 +70,8 @@ from .version import check_cfood_version
 from .scanner import (scan_directory,
                       load_definition,
                       create_converter_registry,
-                      initialize_converters)
+                      initialize_converters,
+                      scan_structure_elements)
 from .debug_tree import DebugTree
 
 logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
@@ -244,6 +245,22 @@ class Crawler(object):
     def generate_run_id(self):
         self.run_id = uuid.uuid1()
 
+
+    def start_crawling(self, items: Union[list[StructureElement], StructureElement],
+                       crawler_definition: dict,
+                       converter_registry: dict,
+                       restricted_path: Optional[list[str]] = None):
+
+        warnings.warn(DeprecationWarning(
+                "The function start_crawling in the crawl module is deprecated. "
+                "Please use scan_structure_elements from the scanner module."))
+        
+        self.generate_run_id()
+        
+        return scan_structure_elements(
+            items, crawler_definition, converter_registry, restrict_path)
+
+
     def crawl_directory(self,
                         crawled_directory: str,
                         crawler_definition_path: str,