Powering Up Your Canvas Course

Below you will find information in a step-by-step format to get your Canvas courses ready for distance learning. At the top is a main checklist to work from. I have added it as a downloadable interactive pdf and included the infographic link.

If your Students and Parents are new to Canvas, I've included two resources you can send to them to prepare them for distance learning.

I just added several videos on Quiz Building, as well.

Next, you will find all of the Level 1 Beginner Skills with more explanation. Then, you'll find a plethora of other resources to use including Intermediate and Advanced Tips.

Just keep scrolling.

Just keep scrolling.

The newsletter is quite long and has a lot of Canvas related information, but since we are all just hanging out at home staying healthy and safe, you've got time to read!

There are several things students should do as they get ready for online learning. Below is a link you can use to send in an introductory email or to include in your "Start Here" module.

Canvas Student Set-Up

Parents are included in their student's Canvas courses as Observers. They will also need to set up their notification preferences and understand how to navigate in Canvas.

Canvas Parent Set-Up

Learn the basics of creating a quiz and which options you can choose, including adding a time limit, multiple attempts, and assigning a modified quiz to a few students.

Learn why you should decide on a naming convention for your quiz questions, how to add a graph or chart to your multiple choice questions, how to use the math question editor, and more.

Canvas User Guides:

How do I create a Multiple Choice quiz question?

Two options are shown for how students can submit work in a quiz: a file upload option and uploading from Google Drive.

Fill in the Blank and Fill in Multiple Blank questions are explained.

Canvas User Guides:

How do I create a Fill-in-the-Blank question?

In this short video, you will learn how to set up a Matching Question in a Canvas quiz.

Learn how to set up a formula question so students get randomized equations.

Canvas User Guides:

How do I create a Numerical Answer quiz question?

How do I create a Formula quiz question with a single variable?

Once you have added all of your questions, learn how to finalize your quiz and get it ready to publish.

By default, students can add their own discussions. To disable this, go to Discussions and click the settings gear. Then, uncheck the appropriate boxes.

Content pages will house important information for students. Enabling Auto-Open Inline Preview for them allow them to view a document without downloading. This is also a place to embed some super-cool tools.

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Best practice is to build your course using Modules. Here are some links to a few more interesting and cool things you can do with them.

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The Calendar has some useful features highlighted here including using the scheduler, adding recurring events, and showing students how to subscribe to the calendar.

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Discussions open up the walls of your classroom and allow your students to communicate with you and their classmates. Get details on enabling options, changing student settings, and more by clicking below.

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Add a rubric, grade using media feedback, and even weight your assignments according to your districts grading policy.

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Get instructions on importing course content from your Master Course or from a course someone has shared with you below.

Sort grades by missing and then send a message to students who haven't submitted right from the gradebook.

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Set Quiz options, give students another attempt at the quiz, or check quiz statistics.

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Time is a teacher’s most valuable resource. Save time and use Canvas more efficiently from your mobile device with Canvas Teacher.

Canvas Teacher allows teachers to facilitate their courses on the go, both inside and outside the classroom. This app provides quick access to three of the most frequent course facilitation tasks for teachers:

• GRADING: Browse submissions and provide feedback to your students with a new and improved mobile SpeedGrader embedded in this app.
• COMMUNICATING: Send announcements and messages (including "Message Students Who..."), and participate in course discussions from the palm of your hand.
• UPDATING: Need to change a due date? Or publish an assignment? Or fix a misspelling? Canvas Teacher allows you to update your course content.

Canvas Teacher is the perfect mobile Canvas companion for course facilitation!

Email: stephenieljordan@gmail.com
Website: 3e-learning.com
Location: Katy, TX
Twitter: @slsjordan