Canvas Instructional Support

Using Student View

You can view a course the same way that your students view your course through Student View. Through student view, you can test navigating through modules, submit assignments, take quizzes, and more. Any progress made in student view will be saved under the Test Student and will remain there until you reset.

Note: While student view works well with most tools, it is not reliable for viewing LTIs and using Groups. It’s also recommended that you do not interact with any students while in Student View (such as in a discussion) as those posts will be visible to students.

Adjusting Notifications

In Canvas, notifications are entirely controlled by the user. You can adjust what you would like to get notifications about through Settings. Notifications about announcements, inbox messages, and more are all set as defaults for all users.

Add Participants to a Course/Change Participant Roles

Instructors and students are added to official course sites automatically through Campus Solutions. Other sites require manual participant management. You may have already added user enrollments to your course in the Course Setup Checklist. However, you can invite users to join your course anytime if the Add People button is available on the People page.

Canvas Roles Permissions

When adding a participant (user) to your Canvas course, you will be asked to assign that user a role. There are several roles available in Illinois State's instance of Canvas, and each role has different permissions. 

Use Your Own Page as the Home Page

The Course Home Page is the first view your students will see when they enter your course. For the Course Home Page, you can customize a page from your course Pages and display it as the Course Home Page. 

Note: You will need to set a custom home page whenever you transfer course content from an old course into a new one, even if the custom page was already set up in the old course. 

Change the Layout of Your Home Page

You can change your Course Home Page to reflect one of five layout options: the Recent Activity Dashboard, Pages Front Page, the Course Modules, the Assignment List, or the Syllabus.

Importing Content from Another Canvas Course

You can import content from another Canvas course in which you are enrolled as a Teacher. You can either import the entire course (all content) or select the specific content you wish to import.

Course Navigation

As an instructor, you can control which links appear in Course Navigation. Canvas includes a set of default Course Navigation links; other links may be available and customizable.

Dashboard Settings

The Dashboard is the first thing you will see when you log into Canvas. It helps you see what is happening in up to 20 of your current and favorite courses. You can adjust your Dashboard by adding nicknames for your courses, customizing the course colors, and favoriting your courses.

Accessing All of Your Courses

To access courses that are not on your Dashboard, you can use the Courses tab > All Courses in your Global Navigation. Here, you can star/unstar courses to add/remove them from your Dashboard and view past enrollments and unfavorited courses.

Note: Once the semester has ended and a course has concluded, it will no longer be on your Dashboard, and you will be unable to favorite the course. However, you can still access it through All Courses in the Courses tab.

Profile and User Settings

Profile and User Settings let you control your personal information in Canvas. Watch video

Publish a Course

If you have permission, you can publish your course from the Dashboard, the Course Home Page sidebar, the Course Settings sidebar, or the Course Setup Checklist.
Note: Once published, your course will be visible to students as early as 30 days before the start of the semester.

Announcements

You can create an announcement to share important information with all users within your course and with users in sections of a course. Watch video

Calendar

This tool helps students and instructors keep track of all the assignments planned throughout the term, keeping everyone on schedule and up to date. Watch video

Discussions

Discussions allow for interactive communication between two or more people; users can participate in a conversation with an entire class or group. Watch video

Groups

Groups are a small version of a course and are used as a collaborative tool where students can work together on group projects and assignments. Watch video

Inbox

The Inbox displays messages chronologically. It allows you to view and reply to conversations and sort them by course or type. Watch video

People

People shows all the users enrolled in your course, either added by your or your institution via SIS import. Watch video

Scheduler

Scheduler is a Calendar tool that creates appointment groups within a course or group. Students can sign up for a time slot within the appointment group.

Syllabus

The Syllabus in Canvas makes it easy to communicate to your students exactly what will be required of them throughout the course in chronological order. Watch video

Grades Overview

Grades can serve as a communication tool between students and instructors and allow instructors to track students' progress. The Gradebook stores all information about student progress in the course, measuring both letter grades and course outcomes. Watch video

Gradebook Options

The Gradebook helps instructors easily view and enter grades for students. Depending on the Grade display type, grades for each assignment can be considered as points, percentages, complete or incomplete, GPA scale, or letter grade.

Enter and Edit Grades

Most likely, you will access SpeedGrader to enter grades. However, you can manually enter and edit grades in the Gradebook. Assignments in the Gradebook are always shown with the assignment's point value.

Add Comments

If you want to leave simple feedback for your students, you can leave a text comment directly from the Gradebook. Your students can also add comments when they submit an assignment, as well as respond to your submission comments in their Gradebook.

Student View

As an instructor, you can access the Grades page for a student in your course. This Grades page shows how students view their grades in the course and allows you to add individual comments to assignments.

Import Grades

You can use a CSV file to upload information for existing assignments, or you can use a CSV file to create new jobs in the Gradebook.

Gradebook Posting Policy

To make some aspects of grading easier, you can automatically apply a grade to missing assignments.

Rubrics Overview

Rubrics are a way to set up custom or Outcome-based assessment criteria for scoring. Rubrics can be set up as non-scoring rubrics, which allows for assessment-based and outcome-based grading without points. Watch video

Add a rubric in a course

If you cannot find a rubric you want to use in your course, you can create a new rubric. You can add the rubric to an assignment and use the rubric for grading and adding comments. You can manage created rubrics in the Manage Rubrics page.

Add a rubric to an assignment

You can add a rubric to an assignment to help students understand expectations for the assignment and how you intend to score their submissions. In addition to assignments, rubrics can also be added to graded discussions and quizzes.

Roll Call Attendance Overview

The Attendance (Roll Call) tool is used for taking attendance in Canvas courses. It can be used for online or face-to-face courses.

Important note: After the first time instructors take attendance using the Roll Call tool, Canvas automatically creates a "Roll Call Attendance" assignment. Instructors will see this assignment in the Assignments tool and as a column in the gradebook. To avoid attendance calculation errors, instructors should not delete, rename, or unpublish the assignment. If the assignment is deleted, the Roll Call tool will not be able to take attendance. By default, the "Roll Call Attendance" assignment is worth 100 points and factors into student's final grades. If you do not want attendance to automatically be calculated this way, you will need to go into Roll Call settings and check the box that says "Do not count attendance toward final grade." To learn more about the Attendance Roll Call tool, see Canvas's instructor guide.

SpeedGrader

SpeedGrader makes it easy to evaluate individual student assignments and group assignments quickly. You can access SpeedGrader through Assignments, Quizzes, Graded Discussions, and the Gradebook. Watch video

"Assign To" Settings

The “Assign To” feature allows you to set different availability dates and due dates for different students, groups, and sections. This easily allows you to set extensions and accommodations.
Note: If you want to make an assignment available to students before the start of the semester, leave the “Available from” field blank.

Assignments Overview

Assignments include Quizzes, graded Discussions, and online submissions (i.e., files, images, text, URLs, etc.). The Assignments page shows students all the Assignments that will be expected of them and how many points each is worth. Watch video

Create an Assignment

You can create assignments on the Assignments page. You can create an assignment shell, which is a placeholder for an assignment within an assignment group, or you can create an entire assignment with all the assignment details.

Assignment Types

Canvas supports five assignment types: Assignments, Discussions, Quizzes, External Tools, and Not Graded. As an instructor, you can select an assignment type when creating an assignment shell.

Group Assignment

When creating or editing a group assignment, you can assign an assignment to specific groups and set different due dates and availability dates for each group.

Weighting Assignment Groups

You can weight final grades based on assignment groups. Selecting this option assigns a weight to each assignment group, not the assignments themselves. Within each assignment group, a percentage is calculated by dividing the total points a student has earned by the total points possible for all assignments in that group.

Note: Any assignment group weighted at 0% will not be factored into student final grades. If you copied your content from a migrated course site, your assignment groups will automatically be set to 0% and need to be adjusted. 

Peer Review

Peer review allows communication between students and can help students master the concepts of a course and learn from each other. Peer reviews can be assigned to show student names or displayed anonymously.

Extra Credit

Extra credit is currently not a default option in Canvas. However, you can give students extra credit using a variety of options, including making an assignment worth zero points, creating an additional assignment group, or using fudge points in a quiz.

Files

Files can house course files, assignments, syllabi, readings, other documents, profile pictures, and user-specific files. Watch video

OneDrive content in Canvas

You can use your Illinois State OneDrive cloud storage to host large files and share them with your students. 

Modules

Modules are designed to organize content and help control the flow of the course. Each module can contain files, discussions, assignments, quizzes, and other learning materials. Watch video

Modules Index Page

As an instructor, you can add modules, add items to a module, and manage module settings. You can also reorder all modules and module items.

Add a Module

With modules, you are essentially creating a one-directional linear flow of what you would like your students to do. Once you create modules, you can add content items, set prerequisites, and add requirements.

Reorder a Module

You can move or reorder entire modules after you’ve created them. You can manually drag and drop the module, or you can use the Move To option. You can also move or reorder module items.

Publish or Unpublish a Module

As an instructor, you can publish or unpublish a module in a course. Unpublished modules are invisible to students.

Add Course Content to Module

You can add new or existing content items in Canvas to a module. You can also add an item to multiple modules or multiple iterations of an item to one module.

Add Quiz to Module

You can add an existing quiz or create a new quiz in a course module.

Add Prerequisites to Module

When you set a module prerequisite, the module is locked until a student completes the required items.

Add Requirements to Module

When you add requirements to a module, students must complete the defined requirements within the module before the module will be marked complete.

Copy a Module

As an instructor, you can copy a module in a course directly into any active course in which you are enrolled. You can also send a module to other instructors at your institution as well as copy individual module items to other courses.

Pages

Pages store content and educational resources that are part of a course or group but don’t necessarily belong in an assignment. Pages can include text, video, links to files, and other course or group content. Watch video

Pages Index Page

You can view all your pages in your course on the Pages Index Page. As an instructor, you can add new pages, edit pages, and remove pages.

Publish or Unpublish a Page

Instructors can publish or unpublish a page in a course. Unpublished content is invisible to students.

Link to other Canvas Pages

Within a page, you can insert links to other Canvas pages within the same course.

Copy a Page to another course

You can copy individual pages in one course directly into any active course you are enrolled in. You can also send pages to other instructors at your institution. When you copy a page, any assets within that page (images, files, etc.) will be included in your page copy.

This Comparison chart shows all the differences between Classic and New Quizzes. There are many common features in Classic Quizzes and New Quizzes, but there are several important distinctions which may influence your choice about which one to use.

Why use Classic Quizzes?

• ReggieNet quizzes will be imported into Classic Quizzes. If you do not want to rebuild your quizzes this semester, using the Classic Quizzes will give you the content you need immediately.
• If you are importing any content from a publisher or outside Canvas, you will need to use Classic Quizzes.

Why use New Quizzes?

• Four new question types are only available in New Quizzes: Categorization, Stimulus, Ordering, and Hot Spot. Consult this page for more information about these types.
• Item Banks can be shared over multiple courses.

Classic Quizzes can be migrated to New Quizzes, so if you do import quizzes from ReggieNet, you can move them over to New Quizzes later.

Contact ProDev@ilstu.edu if you have any questions.

Transferring Assessments and Questions Pools from ReggieNet to Canvas

It is possible for instructors to export both assessments and question pools from ReggieNet's Tests & Quizzes tool. The process requires several steps. Once successfully exported, however, this data can then be important into Canvas for future courses.

Quiz Index page

You can view all your quizzes in your course on the Quizzes Index page. As an instructor, you can also add quizzes and modify quiz settings.

Quizzes Overview

Canvas has four different types of quizzes: graded quiz, practice quiz, graded survey, and ungraded survey.

Create a Quiz

The quiz tool is used to create and administer online quizzes and surveys.

Set Quiz Options

When you create a quiz, you have a variety of options to choose from within a quiz.

Publish or unpublish Quiz

As an instructor, you can publish or unpublish quizzes in a course. Unpublished content is invisible to students, and graded quizzes are excluded from grade calculations.

Import Quiz from QTI Packages

You can easily import quizzes from programs that create QTI files.

Link course content to Quiz question

You can add files and images to your quiz questions by linking to your course content and also link course content in the quiz instructions.

Create a Question Bank

Question Banks are a place to house questions that can be added to quizzes across courses or accounts.

Delete a Question Bank

You can delete Question Banks that you no longer use.

Import Question bank from one Canvas course to another

You can easily share Question Bank questions among several Canvas courses.

Create a quiz with a Question Group linked to a Question Bank

When you link a Question Bank to a Question Group, you will see all of the Question Banks that you have built in the same course, and those you have bookmarked in other courses where you are the Instructor.

View Quiz Results

You can view student quiz results within each quiz in your course by viewing the quiz results page or moderating the quiz.

View Student Quiz Log

This feature is designed to help you investigate problems a student may have in the quiz and gain insight into your questions. Quiz logs are not intended to validate academic integrity or identify cheating for a quiz.

View Practice Quiz Results

You can view results after one or more students have taken the practice quiz.

Regrade a Quiz

If you accidentally published a quiz that needs to be corrected, you can use quiz regrade to edit existing quiz questions and tell Canvas to recalculate student grades.

Giving Students Extra Time on a Published Timed Quiz

If you have set a time limit on your quiz, you can grant access for extra time. If the student hasn't taken the quiz, the extra time will be added to the student's initial attempt and additional attempts. Learn more about managing extra attempts.

Moderate Quiz Link

Once you have published a quiz, the quiz sidebar shows the Moderate Quiz link, which allows you to moderate the quiz for each student in your course. On the Moderate Quiz page you can view the progress of student submissions and view the number of quiz attempts each has taken. You can also grant students extra attempts, grant extra time for timed quizzes, and manually unlock quiz attempts.

Assign a Quiz to an Individual Student

When creating or editing a quiz, you can assign a quiz to a specific student. Availability date functionality is still available for each quiz, and only the student(s) specified in the quiz details can view the quiz.

This Comparison chart shows all the differences between Classic and New Quizzes. There are many common features in Classic Quizzes and New Quizzes but there are several important distinctions which may influence your choice about which one to use.

Why use Classic Quizzes?

• ReggieNet quizzes will import into Classic Quizzes. If you do not want to rebuild your quizzes this semester, using the Classic Quizzes will give you the content you need immediately.
• If you are importing any content from a publisher or outside Canvas, you will need to use Classic Quizzes.

Why use New Quizzes?

• Four new question types are only available in New Quizzes: Categorization, Stimulus, Ordering, and Hot Spot. Consult this page for more information about these types.
• Item Banks can be shared over multiple courses.

Classic Quizzes can be migrated to New Quizzes, so if you do import quizzes from ReggieNet you can move them over to New Quizzes later.

Contact ProDev@ilstu.edu if you have any questions.

Transferring Assessments and Questions Pools from ReggieNet to Canvas

It is possible for instructors to export both assessments and question pools from ReggieNet's Tests & Quizzes tool. The process requires several steps. Once successfully exported, however, this data can then be imported into Canvas for future courses.

Quizzes Overview

Instructors can use this tool to create quizzes using a variety of question types. Quizzes display as assignments in the Assignments page and can be duplicated. Watch video

Create a Quiz

You can create quizzes using various types of content in each quiz.

Create an Item Bank

Item banks can be used to store questions for use in other quizzes. You can use your item banks in any course where you have permission to create and edit a quiz.

Add an item from an item bank

This lesson shows how to add an item from an item bank using the Item Banks button on the Build page. You can also access your item banks when adding content to a quiz.

Manage quiz settings

Delivery settings adjust the way a quiz is delivered to students. To edit the point total, assignment group, due date, availability dates, and the individual students and course sections who will receive the quiz, edit the quiz from the Assignments page.

Grade a quiz

Most quiz items are graded automatically after a student submits the quiz. However, essay and file upload questions must be graded manually.

Add feedback to a question

You can add feedback to any question created with Quizzes. Students can view your feedback when they view their results after submitting a quiz. You can also add feedback to any answer choice when creating a Multiple-choice question.

Add accommodations

You can add accommodations for a student in Quizzes. Accommodation settings include adding or removing time for all quiz attempts and multiplying time limits by a set multiplier.

View quiz results

You can view student quiz results within each quiz in your course by viewing the moderate page in Quizzes. If a student has multiple quiz attempts, you can also view the results of all attempts. You can also print the student's results.