Canvas is back up

Canvas appears to be back up now. Just so you know, Canvas has a “status” that informs you of any current problems. It’s available at https://status.instructure.com.

 

Scott

Canvas is down

Canvas seems to be down. I’m on hold with its support. I’ll provide an update when I get one.

 

Scott

Canvas issue resolved

From Canvas:

 

“The issue causing error messages to appear when users tried to access or edit assignments and quizzes is now resolved. Users are now able to access items that were previously presenting an error message.”

Final Canvas reminders

For those of you teaching with Canvas this semester:

 

Attached is a checklist (with corresponding links) to help your classes get off to a good start. And here is some information/reminders to help, too:

 

1. View Canvas faculty notes and tips. There are a bit too many of these to fit into this email. Also, since Canvas adds new features and enhancements every three weeks, make sure to go to the Canvas Release Notes page to see what’s new.
   
   
2. Wanda Butterly and I will continue to provide faculty technical support. During nights and weekends, you can call Canvas directly at 1-833-300-3467. For students, all daytime support will be handled by LPC’s technical support desk, and they can call Canvas to get their nighttime and weekend questions answered. The student Canvas number is 1-844-600-3467. You might want to note this in your classes.
   
   
3. Publish your courses by the beginning of the day your class starts so students can access them. If you are not teaching an online or hybrid course and want to wait longer to publish your courses, that’s up to you. To publish your course, go to the course home page, and click Publish.
   
   
4. If you are teaching a DE class, contact your students prior to the start of the semester, and encourage them to self-enroll into the Quest for Online Success Course in Canvas. This is a readiness course that prepares students to succeed online. Learn more about Quest. I notified DE students by email, and many have already self-enrolled. A reminder from you would be good, especially since students who added late did not receive the my  email notification. Here are instructions you can copy and paste for your students:
   
   

a.        Go to https://clpccd.instructure.com/enroll/KDENL6. If necessary, copy and paste the URL (without the period at the end) into your browser.

b.        Log into Canvas with your W number. Your password is the first 2 letters of your first name, followed by the first 2 letters of your last name (all lowercase), followed by the last four digits of your W number. If you have already logged into Canvas and changed your password, use that password.

c.         Click the button "Enroll in Course".

d.        Click the button "Go to the Course".

e.        Complete the modules.

5. Also, if you are teaching a DE class and want to see how your course measures up to the quality standards set by the Online Education Initiative, you can compare it to the OEI Course Design Rubric. The LPC Academic Senate has endorsed the rubric as the standards to strive for in DE classes. View the Senate’s resolution. Examples that meet the rubric’s criteria can be found in the Online Course Design Guide and the Course Design Showcase.
   
   
6. Make sure all of your content is accessible to students with disabilities. Everything you need to know about web accessibility, including “how-to” tutorials, is available in a Canvas course in which you have access. Just log into Canvas, and you will see a web accessibility course in your Dashboard called Creating Accessible Course Content.
   
   
7. The Regular Effective Contact Guidelines, approved by the LPC Academic Senate, state that all Distance Education courses, whether fully online or hybrid, must demonstrate regular effective contact with students. For hybrids, this contact is required not only during on-campus meetings, but it is also required online. Read Hybrids @ LPC. Since all DE courses must show evidence of regular effective contact, you should use the Canvas Inbox for all of your email correspondences with students. The Canvas Inbox will automatically save the emails. Emails sent from Outlook will be archived, but they will not be available from a central location.
   
   
8. The LPC DE Committee has developed recommendations, along with answers to frequently asked questions, that are intended to aid instructors—particularly new instructors—in determining how many students to add and when to add those students near the beginning of the semester. View the recommendations and FAQs.
   
   
9. The LPC Online Learning web site was redesigned in early 2018. You might want to verify any links you have to it from within Canvas. The site also includes a link called Faculty Resources, which was created for you.
   
   
10. For financial aid and auditing purposes, you should record the last day of attendance for students who drop DE courses, The last day of attendance is not the last day a student logged into your course; it’s the last day a student actively participated in class. Read Federal Title IV and Last Day of Attendance.
    
    Here is LPC’s DE drop policy:
    
    The instructor may drop students who miss the first meeting of a course. The first meeting of online or hybrid Distance Education courses is the first day of the class as specified in the class schedule listing.  For these courses, instructors may drop students who do not log into their Canvas course and/or complete indicated activities by the third day of classes. DE instructors may drop students if they have not submitted work and/or accessed the class for two consecutive weeks. For Summer courses, DE instructors may drop students if they have not submitted work and/or accessed the class for one week.
    
    
11. Encourage your students to use the NetTutor online tutoring service. View student information about NetTutor. View faculty information about NetTutor.
    
    
12. If you need (or want) a banner for the home page of your course, the attached file is a template to use. Just open it in PowerPoint, modify it, save it as a .PNG file, then upload it into Canvas.
    
    

13.   If you would like to use Canvas’ New Gradebook, follow the instructions below to enable it in your course(s). The New Gradebook features several enhancements, and Canvas is still adding to it. Useage is optional; if you don’t enable it, the existing Gradebook will still be there for you. To enable it: Access a course, click Settings, click Feature Options, click the switch to New Gradebook to turn it on. Keep in mind that the New Gradebook cannot be disabled by an instructor or system administrator when one or both of the following features are applied:  Manually adjust a submission status to none, late, missing, or excused Enable late or missing policies in the Settings menu. Those features are not compatible with the current Gradebook, so enabling their functionality will prevent an instructor from returning to the current Gradebook. Learn how the New Gradebook works.

Good luck with your courses!

Scott

 

Fall Canvas students to be inputted tonight

Canvas instructors:

 

For those of you teaching Fall classes with Canvas, this is a heads-up that Fall 2018 students will be inputted into their Canvas courses tonight. If you don’t want students to access your courses until the start of classes, keep your courses unpublished.

 

Scott

 

Canvas Summer 2018 wrap-up

Summer Canvas instructors,

 

Hope your summer sessions went well. To wrap it up and prepare for next semester, please note the following:

1.       Course access at the end of a semester works differently in Canvas than in Blackboard. Here are the most important points:

a.       You will have full access to your course until Aug. 10 at 11:59 p.m. After that, you will only have read-only access. However, you will be able to export your course.

b.       Students will have full access to your course until Aug. 3 at 11:59 p.m. (unless you have changed the Term end date and time). After the Term end date and time passes, students will have read-only access. They can get to the course by clicking Courses – All Courses. The course will show under Past Enrollments.

c.       If you want students to have full access after the Term end date and time, go into Settings, increase the Term end date and time, then check the box that says: Users can only participate in the course between these dates.  

d.       If you don’t want students to have any access to the course after the Term end date and time, scroll down in Settings, and check the box that says: Restrict students from viewing course after end date.

2. Check the accuracy of your grades, then download your Gradebook and course separately. For students who do not complete assignments by the deadline dates, manually give them zeros in the gradebook. If you leave their grade cells blank, those missing assignments won't count against them. Canvas has a feature in the gradebook settings called Treat Ungraded as 0, but this does not automatically convert dashes to zeros; it only changes the Totals column. Students won’t see zeros or any changes in Totals when they check grades.
   

When you are finished with grades, download your Gradebook by clicking Export – CSV File. Keep your exported Gradebook on your computer or backup drive for safekeeping.

To archive your course and save it for safekeeping (in case anything happens to the Canvas server), go to Settings – Export Course Content – make sure Course is chosen under Export Type, then click Create Export. Once the process is finished, click New Export to download the file to your computer or external/online drive.

 

3.     If you are going to move your current course into a subsequent semester’s course, you can either copy a previous semester's course content or export the previous course and import it into the new course. You can do all of these by going to Settings in a course. While in Settings, do NOT click the Copy this Course button on the right side; this tool creates a new course that your students will not be able to access.

a.     Learn how to copy a course.

b.     Learn how to export a course.

c.     Learn how to import a course.

4.     If you are teaching a Distance Education course next semester, you should send a welcome letter to your students a week or so prior to the first day of classes. A template is attached. I have also attached a syllabus template for your optional use. If you put either or both into Canvas, you will need to convert to accessible PDFs beforehand. I even have an entire course template, and if you’re interested in that, let me know.

5.     If you haven’t yet requested your course(s) for next semester, log into Class-Web, click Menu for Faculty, and click the Canvas link at the bottom.

Scott