Previous Educatus blog posts have introduced Perusall to turn pre-class readings into social learning. In this post, I discuss how instructors might use Perusall to overcome discussion board fatigue and provide resources on using Perusall along with sample learning activities. Perusall is a free social learning tool that students can access through Canvas. Students have…
By Roberta Campbell-Chudoba Perhaps you are using Discussions in Canvas as a supplement to your face-to-face class or using it in an online course. While students’ posts may provide evidence of their learning and allow for online engagement, giving feedback on the posts is a vital part of the process – and as you are…
By Roberta Campbell-Chudoba Small formatting changes on Canvas Pages, Assignments, Quizzes and the Syllabus page can make your course more accessible. Using the suggestions below will improve clarity, readability, and navigation for all your students. In the Rich Content Editor (RCE) menu bar, illustrated below: The drop-down menu on the Paragraph option [1] has three…
During in-class discussions, the entire class and the instructor may be part of the same discussion, but sometimes instructors put students into smaller groups, with multiple discussions happening around the room. While the instructor may be able to walk around the room and listen in on what the students are saying, they can’t catch everything…
By Roberta Campbell-Chudoba The exchange of questions and responses is vital to teaching and learning. The types of questions we pose as instructors should grab our students’ attention and curiosity, reinforce key points, encourage reflection, and foster active learning. Discussions in Canvas – Asking Good Questions – Part 1 explored creating open-ended questions by using…
By Roberta Campbell-Chudoba Asking questions is one of the most powerful tools we have as instructors. Just like asking good questions in class, promoting discussion with questions that capture students’ attention and stimulate intellectual engagement can be facilitated online, using Canvas Discussions. Crafting questions for a discussion forum depends on the purpose of the discussion,…
The University has announced a return to campus stating Feb. 7th. With the exception of some specific programs designed to provide hybrid options, instructors are not expected to teach students face to face (F2F) and online at the same time in their F2F course(s). However, you may be trying to provide some extra options for…
With contributions from Carmen Harder, Training Specialist, Client Experience, Client and Technology Success The dashes that you see on the Canvas gradebook indicate missing assignments. When calculating final grades Canvas does not treat these missing assignments as zero. In this example the final grade for the student is 60%. To make sure that missing assignments…
By Roberta Campbell-Chudoba The Immersive Reader option in Canvas helps students access your course materials, whether they have a certain learning or medical disability, use English as an additional language – or could simply benefit from its text-to-speech function. The Immersive Reader button, at the top right-hand of Pages, Assignments, the Course Home Page, and…
Zoom is a web conferencing tool available in Canvas. To be enabled, it has to be added to the course navigation menu. Zoom can be used to schedule lectures, group meetings or appointments. Students can join any virtual meeting directly through Canvas and can review any recorded sessions through the Zoom Meetings link. The videos…