Content is how most of the material in your Canvas course is experienced by students. They will communicate about the course with each other and the instructor; they will complete some kind of assessment activities; but their learning will begin with the content that is presented to them. Canvas uses three primary tools for storing, presenting, and organizing content. Items in each content tool can be set to Published or Unpublished (draft) status, which is one control over the visibility of those items to students.
Files can be just about any kind of electronic file that you can create with a computer. Canvas makes it easy to upload files to your course and you can provide links to uploaded files from anywhere inside a course. Many types of files can be previewed inside the Canvas page, so it is possible for students to view the contents of a file within the browser without having to download it first. However, the PDF file format is still recommended as a universal file type.
Pages are web pages built within Canvas using the Rich Content Editor. What you are looking at right now is a Page. Uploaded files can be linked to a Page and even previewed within the Page, so this tool is the ideal way to provide the instructional context around the content that you provide to students. Pages can include links to external websites and embedded media such as videos as well. This class has a hands-on assignment to create a Page.
Though you can provide students access to a list of all the Pages and Files inside a course, the best way to organize the material is through the use of the Modules tool. We normally recommend hiding Pages and Files so that your students only see content where you want them to see it. Modules can also include links to communication and assessment activities and help you present material to students in the manner and order you think will best help them achieve the learning objectives of your course. Note that the visibility setting of a Module (published or unpublished) overrides the visibility setting of its component items. This class has a hands-on assignment to create a module.
As you may have noticed the instructions for the module exercises glided over some of the options available with that tool. These additional options allow for greater control over the order and steps required for students to access course material.
Modules can be locked until a particular date and time. This helps students focus their time on task and proceed through the course at more or less the same pace as a group.
You can also require sequential viewing, which means that students cannot look at a module item until they have looked at the previous item in the same module. This includes links to communication and assessment activities. For example, you could require that students look at a content page before they are able to take a quiz on that content.
Finally, prerequisites and requirements can be imposed. Requirements must be met before students can move to a following module, and the following module must have meeting those requirements set as a prerequisite. For example, you could set up a requirement that each item in your welcome module (module 1) be viewed before that module is complete. Then you could set up a prerequisite that module 1 is complete before students can access module 2.
Canvas makes it easy to incorporate multimedia into a course. First, you can embed images from your Canvas Files, from anywhere on the internet (image URL), or search for a creative commons licensed image on Flickr. This is all done by clicking on the Embed Image button on the Rich Content Editor toolbar. Canvas prompts you for descriptive alt text, which helps make your course site universally accessible. You can also upload an image from your local computer via the sidebar when working in the Rich Content Editor.
For multimedia, you can use a webcam or microphone connected to your computer (desktop or laptop) to record video or audio commentary directly into the Rich Content Editor using the Record/Upload Media button. You could use this to provide an audio reply to a discussion post, for example, or add a video touch to a weekly announcement. You can attach a closed caption file using the Canvas media player.
In addition, the Rich Content Editor automatically recognizes the share link from a YouTube video. It creates a thumbnail and an embedded player, and it also includes a link to the video's page in YouTube. So adding instructional context around a YouTube video is easy: create a content page, type the instructions for what students should do during the video or comments on how the video fits in to the course, and then paste the share link from YouTube into the editor.
Also, you can paste the embed code from another video source (e.g., Vimeo) by opening the HTML Editor view in the Rich Content Editor. Finally, you can upload a video or audio file to the Files tool and embed that using the Record/Upload Media button. The Canvas Media Player converts a variety of files into a format compatible with the user's browser. Uploaded videos can also have closed caption files attached for the purposes of meeting guidelines for usability.
Canvas has a special link called the Syllabus that opens to a page with a description and an automatically generated calendar of course events. The description can be edited using the Rich Content Editor, so embedded media and links to files can be included.
On the Home page of every unpublished course is a link to the Setup Checklist, which Canvas provides as a list of things to do as you get your course ready for use with students. Clicking on it overlays your course page with a series of steps and links to instructions for each step by Canvas. We will explore several of these steps during this course:
Import Content Depending on whether you are moving material from another system or it is a subsequent offering of the same class in a different term, you might make use of this step. However, importing materials is not always the best option when first establishing a Canvas course.
Add Course Assignments Unit 4 of this class is on assessment and will include this step.
Add Students to the Course Student enrollment is handled automatically based on official enrollment records, so this step may be ignored.
Add Files to the Course The item Content Considerations in this module discusses files.
Select Navigation Links The next page in this module is on Course Navigation.
Choose a Course Home Page The final hands-on assignment for Unit 2 is to choose a Home Page
Add Course Calendar Events Unit 3 of this class is on communication and includes information on the Course Calendar
Add TAs to the Course
Publish the Course This is the final step in making a course usable by students. An unpublished course may have students enrolled in it, but those students cannot access it when they log in to Canvas.
The Setup Checklist can be accessed at any time, even for published courses, by clicking the Course Setup Checklist button on the sidebar of the course home page.
Course Navigation is the list of links on the left side of the course page that you (and your students) use to access different parts of your course and access certain tools. As an instructor you control which links are visible to students, and this is done via the Navigation tab on the Settings page. It is possible for a tool to be used in a class but the link not to be visible to students. For example the Pages tool or the LockDown Browser setup tool. The Settings link is one that is never visible to students.
There are many other options on the Settings page, and our Canvas system administrators in Instructional Technology Services can answer questions about the available items. In this class you have already read about the Student View option on the Settings page.