Welcome to the Canvas Experts Corner!

Release and Deploy Notes

Deploy updateshappen every other Wednesday. These include changes aimed at bug fixes, performance updates, minor updates to the user interface, and preparations for new feature releases.

Release updateshappen on the third Saturday of each month. These include new features and any major updates to the user interface.

A summary of these updates can be found in the Get Help menu within Canvas; they will be listed as Instructor Role Updatesand include a date that those changes are/were scheduled to take place. If you select the Instructor Role Updates title within the Get Help screen, it will open the corresponding Deploy or Release Notes pages in a new browser tab or window. These pages have more detailed information about the changes, often including screenshots or video demonstrations. On these Release and Deploy Notes pages, there is an indicator above each change that shows who the change applies to. Examples: Admin, All Users, Students, Instructor.

Note that these summaries and notes will sometimes refer to products not available in our instance of Canvas. For example, the August 2024 Release Notes speak about an enhancement to the Lucid integration for Canvas, and this is not available in OHIO’s Canvas environment. They may also speak about items that are being released as Feature Previews.

Feature Previews

Sometimes Canvas will make a feature available within the system while it is still in development. They call these Feature Previews. They make these available early for two primary reasons: so that users can have access to that enhanced functionality as soon as reasonably possible and to gather feedback on these changes to shape their final results.

The Ohio University Canvas Administrators will perform a risk assessment on each of these new Feature Previews. If the item is deemed low risk, we will make it available for instructors to use at their discretion. If the item in its Feature Preview state is deemed to be moderate or high risk, it will remain unavailable until enough improvements are made for that risk level to be low. It is important to note that if you choose to use a Feature Preview in your course, it is subject to change while it has that Feature Preview label attached to it. Additionally, Canvas may ask for your feedback on that feature.

Ideas for Improvement

Many of the enhancements and new features that are made available in Canvas came from customer requests for improvements. If you have an idea for an improvement or new feature within Canvas, you can submit those requests directly to the vendor. Inside Canvas, if you select the Get Help option from the main menu, you will see an option that says, “Have an idea to improve Canvas?”. If you select that option, you will be able to submit your recommendations.

Summary

Canvas receives regular updates from the vendor including Release and Deploy updates (new features, enhancements, bug fixes, and security updates), and Feature Previews (early access features still in development from the vendor). If you’re looking for a specific feature, function, or fix that Canvas does not currently provide, you can submit ideas for improvement that the vendor reviews regularly.  

If you are importing tests from Blackboard into Canvas, those can only be imported into Classic Quizzes. But don't worry, if you want the functionality of New Quizzes there is a way to convert them. If you are building your quizzes directly in Canvas, we recommend using New Quizzes for its more advanced features such as more question types and individual student time adjustments.

Understanding Classic Quizzes vs. New Quizzes

Canvas maintains support for both Classic Quizzes and New Quizzes but is no longer developing Classic Quizzes. Currently, there is no timeline to end support for Classic Quizzes, but all future development will be in New Quizzes. Basic question types, such as essay, multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank, file upload, etc. are available in both tools, but New Quizzes provides additional question types, such as categorization and ordering. You can also shuffle questions globally and shuffle answers per question. In addition, New Quizzes allows you to add extra time for an individual student, or for the whole course (not just a single test, unlike Classic Quizzes). Just remember that you will need to use Classic Quizzes for any quiz imports from Blackboard. If you would like a full comparison of the two tools, Canvas has a comparison table that goes into more detail.

Activating New Quizzes in Canvas

By default, the New Quizzes feature is turned off in our instance of Canvas. With many instructors importing quizzes from Blackboard, we needed to ensure that Classic Quizzes were available as the default option to select. So, before migrating to or creating New Quizzes, you must enable the New Quizzes feature in your Canvas course. This can be done within the Settings area of your course, by selecting the Feature Options tab.

Expert Tip: If you do not plan on migrating or using Classic Quizzes in your course, you can select Disable Classic Quiz Creationin the Feature Options tabto remove that option when creating a quiz.  

Importing Quizzes from Blackboard to Canvas

Here are some factors to consider when you import your tests and pools from Blackboard . There is a maximum course size limit of 2GB (2000MB) in Canvas , so if you already have large files, such as video or PowerPoint files in your course, you may have difficulty importing additional materials if you are near that limit. Please check your file usage in your course to make sure you are within the course size quota. If your import fails due to this size limit, you will need to re-export content from your Blackboard course in smaller pieces and then import each of those into your Canvas course.

We have had a few reports from instructors who were using multiple pools or random blocks in Blackboard that had some issues importing into Canvas properly. These imports resulted in a test with settings but no questions. If this happens to you, please submit a ticket .

Migrating Classic Quizzes to New Quizzes

Classic Quizzes within Canvas can be migrated to New Quizzes to take advantage of the tool's more robust features. You can migrate quizzes either individually or copy/import as New Quizzes in bulk. Please keep in mind that if your quizzes draw from question banks, you must ensure that you choose both the quizzes and the question banks that supply the questions.

Summary

Understanding which quiz tool will fit your needs will help streamline your course management and provide a better assessment experience for your students. Classic Quizzes will help you import your Blackboard quizzes into Canvas to get started in your course. Taking advantage of the rich features in New Quizzes will allow you to simplify some processes and keep you building towards the future. 

Understanding Roles and Permissions

In Canvas, permissions allow users certain access to features and functions within a course or the system. Roles are a collection of these permissions. There are two classifications of roles within Canvas, Course and Account. Within each of those classifications, there are several unique roles.  This post will help you to determine which course role is appropriate for extra users in your course, such as a Teaching Assistant.  It also gives an overview of some account roles used by Colleges and Departments.

Course Roles

Course roles apply only to the course for which the role is assigned. For example, the same person may be a student in a training course and an instructor in another course. Another way to think of this is that roles are applied on a course-by-course basis. Course roles can be granted in two ways: by the data integration with our student information system, PeopleSoft, or manually.

If our student information system, has you listed as being the instructor of record for a course or being enrolled in the course as a student, then the corresponding role in that course will be automatically provided by the data integration between the two systems. Eight weeks before the course's start date, the courses and any known instructors of record are automatically enrolled in their Canvas courses. Two weeks before the course's start date, students are automatically enrolled in their courses.  The timeline and process for adding enrollments to Canvas is the same as it was in Blackboard.

Manually adding users to courses can be done two ways, through self-enrollment or by using the rostering tool, called People in Canvas. If you have a manually created course, such as a training course or an orientation course, you can have that course set up to allow students to enroll themselves in the course. This only works for manually created courses, academic courses cannot allow self-enrollment. For more information, please visit this support article: Enabling Self Enrollment in your Canvas Course. For instructions on adding users to your course using the People tool in Canvas, please visit this support article:  Adding and Removing TAs, Instructors and Other Users in a Canvas Course.

Now that we know how to add a user to a course in Canvas, let’s talk about the roles and corresponding permissions available.

Roles	Permissions
Teacher	This is the role given to instructors.  It has all available permissions needed for instruction.
TA	This is the role designed for teaching assistants.  It can create content and perform grading tasks. This role cannot publish, cross list (merge) or reset a course, or manage Outcomes.  TAs can only add students to a course, they cannot add any other roles and they cannot remove any users from a course.
Designer	This role is like the course builder role in Blackboard.  Those with this role can build content in a course, they can publish and reset a course.  They cannot access grades or cross list (merge) courses. Designers can only add students to a course, they cannot add any other roles and they cannot remove any users from a course.
Student	Can access and interact with content that has been made available to them by one of the other roles.

For additional information about course roles in Canvas, please visit this support article: Roles in Canvas.

Account Roles

Before we dive into the specifics of Account roles, let’s take a moment to discuss what Account means to Canvas. Canvas has a hierarchical structure that I like to think of in terms of nested folders. Canvas calls these Accounts and Sub Accounts. So, our Account is Ohio University. The Sub Accounts are the Colleges. And the Sub-Sub Accounts are the Departments. Courses can be found in the department level folders. Here is an example:

• Ohio University
  • College of Arts & Sciences
    • Mathematics
      • Intro to Algebra

Account roles can be applied at the Account (University), Sub Account (College) or Sub-Sub Account (Department) level.  Below is a table explaining the options available at the College or Department level.

Role	Access Level	Role Purpose	Who can request
Sub Account Admin	College or Department	This role is for college or department staff that need full access to the college or department folders to support their students and instructors.  This role may also be granted to college or department staff that need elevated access for accreditation needs.	College=Dean, Associate Dean, or Assistant Dean Department = Department Chair
Sub Account Outcomes Admin	College or Department	This role was created for the colleges and departments that are interested in piloting Outcomes and Rubrics.	College=Dean, Associate Dean, or Assistant Dean Department = Department Chair

If you would like to learn more about the Sub Account admin role, this recorded training session is a good resource. If you would like to learn more about Outcomes and Rubrics, please view this recorded training session .

Messaging

Canvas supports direct messaging within Canvas between instructors and students through their 'Inbox' tool. Inbox is a two-way messaging tool that is used instead of email to communicate with a course, group, or individual user. Anywhere in Canvas that you see the envelope icon indicates that you can have direct communication with your students. 

While the Inbox tool may seem inconvenient or unnecessary, it does add some benefits. There is an audit trail of all messages sent between the instructor and students within Canvas, should there be a grade dispute or other area of concern. Students have said they find it convenient to have all the related course materials and communications collected in one location. All their messages about a specific course are searchable within that course.  

Here are some guides from Canvas that explain the Inbox tool in more detail:

• What is the Inbox?  
• How do I use the Inbox as an instructor?
• How do I use the Inbox as a student?

Announcements

In Blackboard, many instructors used the Announcements functionality to force an email message to be sent whenever they posted an announcement. Canvas does not have this functionality. Announcements will appear for students in their Recent Activity Dashboard , their To Do list , and within their course.

In Canvas, there are a few new features that were not available for Announcements in Blackboard. Instructors can enable the ability for students to reply to Announcements . Canvas has recently undertaken a redesign of its Announcements feature which you can enable now, or it will be enabled automatically on July 20, 2024.

Notifications

So, if you can’t directly email students through Canvas, and you can’t force your Announcements to be sent via email, how do you ensure that your students are receiving your communications in a timely fashion? We recommend that you take a bit of time in your first class session to talk with your students about the Notifications options in Canvas .  

While you cannot force an email message to your students, you and your students can opt to receive email notifications about certain types of communications and notices within Canvas. You can select whether you want to be notified immediately, daily, weekly, or not at all for a vast list of course activities. And if you are using one of the Canvas mobile apps, you can set push notifications for these areas as well. (Please note that you will have to enable push notifications for the app on your mobile device as well.)

Here are some guides from Canvas that explain notification settings in more detail:

• How do I manage my Canvas notification settings as an instructor?
• How do I manage my Canvas notification settings as a student?

Summary

Canvas’s different approach to communications between instructors and students means that you cannot email a student from within Canvas. You can, however, use the Canvas communication tools along with notification settings to receive some Canvas updates via email. These messaging and announcement features in Canvas can be used to support dynamic communication with students in your course.

Welcome back to the Canvas Experts Corner. This week we are going to discuss the Microsoft Teams integrations in Canvas. Integrations are a way to utilize the functionality provided by other vendors within Canvas. For Microsoft Teams there are two integrations: Teams Classes and Teams Meetings. We have had some questions about the best option for setting up Teams Classes and how to find information about using the Teams integrations in Canvas.

Enable Microsoft Sync

Before you can use any Microsoft integration (Teams Classes, Teams Meetings, or OneDrive) in your Canvas courses, you must enable the Microsoft Sync functionality.

1. Navigate to your Canvas course
2. Select Settingsfrom the course navigation menu
3. On the Settings page, select Integrations
4. Ensure the Microsoft Syncis set to on (the toggle switch should be pushed to the right)

Teams Classes

There are three ways to set up Teams Classes at Ohio University. Below are those options and some information to help you select which is best for your use case.

1. You can use the integration in Canvas . (This is our recommended method)
   • You must wait until student enrollments are loaded to Canvas, two weeks before the course start date.
   • The Team will be given the same name as your Canvas course.
   • The membership of the Team will be automatically updated based on the enrollments (users) in your Canvas course.
     • This includes if you have cross-listed (merged) courses, and anyone you may have manually added to the course.
     • If students add the course after the Team is created, they will be automatically added to the Team. If they drop the course after the Team is created, they will be automatically dropped from the Team.
   • There will be a link within your Canvas course navigation menu that will take your students directly to the Team.
2. You can use the Teams self-service tool .
   • This creates a Team that is accessed directly in the Microsoft Teams app, rather than through Canvas.
   • This method pulls its information from the data feed between our student information system, PeopleSoft, and Blackboard.
   • Since it uses Blackboard data, you must wait until student enrollments are loaded to Blackboard, two weeks before the course start date.
   • The enrollments in this team will be based on the enrollments in your Blackboard course, so it will not see anyone who has been manually added in Canvas.
   • If someone adds the course after the Team is created, they will be added to the Team. But if someone drops after the Team is created, they are not dropped from the Team.
3. You can create a ticket requesting that our Microsoft admins create a Team for you.
   • This Team would be named whatever you request the name to be.
   • The enrollments will be static and will include only the list of people that you provide at the time you request that the Team be created.
     • Any enrollment changes would have to be processed manually within the Team.

Teams Meetings

The Teams meeting integration within Canvas allows instructors to schedule Teams meetings with all or select students from within the course. The meeting invitation will show up in the instructor’s Outlook calendar and the recipients, as with any normal Teams meeting invitation. In addition, the meeting will also appear within the Canvas Course, under the Microsoft Teams meetinglink in the course navigation menu. It is important to note that the meetings do not appear in the Canvas course calendar. If you would like them to appear in the Canvas course calendar, you would need to manually add the calendar entry. Please review this guide from Microsoft for additional information about using Microsoft Teams meetings in Canvas .

Naming of the Links

Another common question we are asked regarding the Teams integrations in Canvas is about the way they are named in the Canvas course navigation menu - "Microsoft Teams classes" vs. "Microsoft Teams meetings."

When we add an integration into Canvas, the way the third-party vendor (in this case Microsoft) builds the integration determines what the integration is named and where the integration appears.  Unfortunately, we cannot change that.  So, we are not able to capitalize classes or meetings in those integration names.

Pro Tip:If you do not plan to use the Microsoft integrations in your Canvas course, you can hide them from your course navigation menu.

1. Go to Settingsin the course navigation menu
2. On the Settings page, select the Navigationtab
3. On this page, you can drag anything you want to remove from your course navigation menu from the top section to the bottom section
4. Select Saveto confirm your changes

Summary

Microsoft offers two Teams integrations for Canvas, Teams Classes, and Teams Meetings. You can use Microsoft Teams Classes to create a Teams Class space that is named for your Canvas course and syncs with your Canvas course enrollments. You can use Microsoft Teams Meetings to create meetings with your students and have those meetings appear within the Teams meeting link in your Canvas course.   

Welcome to the Canvas Expert Corner, our new blog to support instructor's deeper and fuller understanding of Canvas. We'll be sharing weekly(ish) bonus content to help us all become more comfortable with Canvas. Topics will be addressed based on common questions and recent changes. As we are at the end of our first semester of teaching in Canvas, it seems to be an opportune time to discuss how Canvas handles course visibility, as it is quite different than what we are familiar with in Blackboard.

In Blackboard, instructors control when students can see course content by using the Make Course Available/Unavailable lockinside Original courses, or by the Open or Make Course Private optionfrom the Course menu. Additionally, Instructor access to courses is controlled by the data feed between our student information system, PeopleSoft, and Blackboard. Instructors have full access (the ability to see and edit content) to their courses beginning eight weeks before the course start date and ending two years after the course end date.

In Canvas, there are varying degrees of access and visibility for students and instructors, and three main ways to configure it.  

Option 1: Publish

First, there is a Publishoption. When an instructor has their course ready for students to view it, they will Publishthat Canvas course. However, unlike Blackboard, a course cannot be Unpublishedif there are any student assignments submitted in the course.

So how do we end student access to a course if we cannot Unpublishit?  

Option 2: Term Dates

By default, this is handled by the Term Dates within Canvas. Term Dates are like Semester start and end dates, with a slight modification. In Canvas, OHIO has three terms per academic year: Fall, Spring, and Summer. First, Full, and Second summer semesters are all contained within the Summer term. You can find the official semester start and end dates by viewing the official Academic Calendar on the Registrar’s website .  

For Canvas, OHIO’s Terms begin three weeks before the official semester start date and end the Thursday following the semester end date. For example, Summer Semester 2024 begins on May 13 and ends on August 17. The Canvas Summer Term begins on April 22 and ends on August 22.

By default, students will have full access to Published Canvas courses only within the dates of the given Term. After the term's end date, student access will become read-only, meaning they can see content available to students but can no longer participate in the course.  

When the student access switches to read-only, what Canvas calls “Concluded”, this not only impacts how these courses appear to students but also how the students appear within those courses to instructors. For students, their courses will disappear from their Dashboardand they will need to go to Coursesin the left navigation menu and select All Coursesto find an area called Past Enrollments. This is where they will find their Concluded courses.

For instructors, when your student’s enrollments are concluded in your course at the end of the term, the students will disappear from your roster, which Canvas calls People, and from your Gradebook. The information still exists in the course, it just becomes hidden from your view by default. We have a help article with detailed instructions for Viewing Student Information After Their Course Access Concludes .

Option 3: Customize Course Availability

As noted, Term Dates are the default control for when students will have access to course content. But there is another option as well. Instructors can set their own custom availability options on a course-by-course basis. You can set a custom date when students can start or stop having access to your courses. There is one thing to keep in mind when adding custom dates for your course.  Canvas allows students to submit assignments after the Due Date has passed. So, if the students have full access (not the read-only Concluded access) to your course, that includes the ability to submit assignments, participate in discussions, and use the Inbox feature to message their classmates. We have a help article that has instructions for Controlling Student Visibility in your Canvas Course .

Just like the student access changes in Canvas, there are some additional changes in Canvas for instructor access as well. In Canvas, six months after the end date of the Term in which the course took place, the course becomes read-only or Concluded for the instructor. This will allow you to view the content of the course and copy content from this course to a future course, but will no longer allow you to edit content in the course.

And lastly, in a discussion about Canvas Course Visibility, we would be remiss if we did not include a short explanation of the Visibility field within your Canvas Course Settings. There are three options for Course Visibility: Course, Institution, and Public. Canvas has a help document that explains Canvas Course Visibility Options .  The one thing that differs for OHIO from the Canvas documentation is that Public access does not work with our system. Since you must have an OHIO ID and password to be able to log into Canvas, if you give a course link to someone without that access, they will get an error message that they do not have the permissions to view the content.

Summary

Canvas handles course visibility very differently than Blackboard. When and how students access the content in your Canvas course, as well as how you access it as an instructor, can be controlled by three variables: Publication, Term Dates, and Custom Availability Options. For more information please visit:

• Viewing Student Information After Their Course Access Concludes
• Controlling Student Visibility in your Canvas Course
• Canvas Course Visibility Options