Canvas
Canvas is UBC’s primary learning management system for delivering and creating customized online course content and assessments. In Canvas, instructors can easily share course materials (e.g. syllabus, lecture notes, readings) via various formats (text or multimedia), communicate with students (via messages or announcements), promote student collaboration, discussion of topics, create quizzes and assignments, calculate grades, administer exams, and much more.
Canvas can also be used with other learning technologies such as Kaltura, Zoom, WeBWorK, iClicker, Piazza, and Gradescope.
Key Features
- Share course content: share course materials (e.g. syllabus, lecture notes, readings) via various formats (e.g. text, files, videos, audios, links)
- Communicate with students: communicate with students using Announcements and Inbox (the Canvas messaging tool)
- Create assignments and quizzes: create assignments of various formats (e.g. online, with external tools, essays, file uploads) and quizzes (e.g. practice quizzes, graded quizzes, surveys)
- Facilitate discussions: create discussion forums for students to ask questions and course topic discussions
- Facilitate group work: create groups to facilitate group assignments and work
- Manage grades and provide feedback: assign grades for assessments, manage options for grading, and provide individual feedback to students using the SpeedGrader and Gradebook
Getting Started
For all UBC courses, a Canvas site is automatically created and enrolled students will be automatically added to the site. Please email Science LT at LT.support@science.ubc.ca if you do not see your course listed.
You can log into Canvas from canvas.ubc.ca and start setting up your course.
Instructions
- Build your Canvas course
- Add content to your Canvas course using Modules
- Communicate with your students
- Create groups in Canvas
- Create assignments in Canvas
- Create discussions in Canvas
- Create Classic Quizzes or New Quizzes
- Grade assignments in Canvas
- View learning technology tools integrated with Canvas
Additional Resources
- LT Hub – Canvas Instructor Guide
- LT Hub – Canvas Student Guide
- Instructure – Canvas Instructor Guide
- Instructure – Canvas Troubleshooting Guide
- Instructure – Canvas Community Forum
- Instructure – Canvas Video Tutorials
- Enroll in Canvas 101 (This is a self-paced course that allows you to explore the functions of Canvas)
FAQs
2. How come my students are unable to see my Canvas course site?
There are multiple possible reasons why your students are unable to see your Canvas course site. The following are the most common.
Your course is not published
If your course is unpublished, your students will not be able to see it. To publish your course:
- Go to your course in Canvas and click on Home from the Course Navigation on the left-hand side.
- Under “Course Status” on the right-hand side, click on “Publish”.
- Once you have published your course, you will see a green confirmation message that your course was published.
Learn more about publishing a course.
The start date of your course has not arrived yet.
By default, the course start date is set to the first day of class.
You can check whether your course start date has arrived by going to the Settings in the Course Navigation of your course. To change the course start date to an earlier date, please follow the instructions below:
- Click on Settings from the Course Navigation on the left-hand side (if not already).
- Click on the “Course Details” tab.
- Change the course participation dates to “Course” and manually add an earlier start date.
- Note: If you manually change the course start and end dates, we recommend that you also set a course end date. Otherwise, students will have indefinite access to the site even after the term ends.
Learn more about changing the start and end dates for a course.
Your course material is locked
It’s possible that you have locked modules, files, assignments, discussions, or quizzes.
For Modules:
- Click on Modules from the Course Navigation in the left-hand side.
- Click on the 3 dots (right side) of a module and click on “Edit”.
- If selected, deselect the module.
- Click on “Update Module” to save changes.
For assignments:
- Click on Assignments from the Course Navigation on the left-hand side.
- Click on an assignment and then on “Edit”.
- Scroll down to the section called “Assign”.
- Check if there is a date in “Available from” and “Until”. If there is one, remove it or change it so students can access the assignment.
- If you make any changes, click on “Save” afterwards to save those changes.
For discussions and quizzes, please follow the same steps as above.
Your course material is unpublished
It’s possible that your course material is unpublished.
To publish course material:
Additional FAQs
Last updated on: October 1, 2024