Category: Canvas

Canvas is an important learning tool in our district. We hope that you continue to find it a valuable teaching and communication tool. If you are new to the district or have questions come up about it, we want you to be aware of several resources that are available to you.

First, click the “Help” icon on the Global Navigation Menu. For general and common questions try searching the Canvas guides. If your problem or question is unique and specific to your situation you can chat online or call the Canvas Support hotline. You can be connected with a support agent that can help you almost immediately.

If you would like to slowly browse resources, please check out our resources at the P-CCS Tech website, https://tech.pccsk12.com/canvas-lms/

If you are instructional staff working on meeting your PD expectations, please note we have a number of courses including the following listed below (all of them are 3 hours) that can help increase your understanding of how to use Canvas effectively available for you in the Catalog. https://catalog.pccsk12.com/

• Canvas 1.0 (new)
• Canvas 2.0
• Canvas 3.0
• Canvas in the Face to Face Classroom
• Simplify and Streamline your Elementary Classroom with Canvas (new)

As always, please submit a tech ticket if you have any questions. https://links.pccsk12.com/helpdesk

 

Many teachers have heard of break-out style lessons that build problem-solving and collaboration skills in students. They may be used more often to help engage students as holiday breaks inch closer. Did you know you can create your own digital break-outs with a Canvas module? You can go beyond a one time game and gamify an entire unit with a storyline. Check out the guest blog post on Ditch that Textbook for more information. https://ditchthattextbook.com/gamify-canvas-lms/

While you are there, you might consider signing up for the annual, free Ditch Summit.

In this online “summit” there are nine video presentations from awesome presenters on topics related to tech and solid teaching and learning. Including previous years’ sessions, you’ll have access to more than 80 video presentations!

This year, it’s scheduled for December 12, 2022, to January 6, 2023.

Get registered for free at: DitchSummit.com.

HOW IT WORKS: New presentations are released every day. They remain available until the end of the summit so you can re-watch or catch up on any you’ve missed. They’re pre-recorded, so you can watch them whenever you want until the summit closes. After that, the summit ends and the videos are unavailable to watch anymore.

Sign up for the digital summit at DitchSummit.com.

This year’s speakers include:
Ken Shelton, education leader and techquity advocate
Cornelius Minor, author and consultant, The Minor Collective
Jed Dearybury and Julie Jones, authors and playful learning advocates
Holly Clark, author, speaker, and blended learning expert
Amanda Sandoval, history and EL teacher
Hedreich Nichols, consultant and award-winning educator
Mandy Froelich, educator mental health change agent
Al Thomas, educator, filmmaker, photographer, YouTuber
Michele Eaton, online academy director, author, speaker

 

As we transition from out October Professional Development day to our November PD window, you might want to declutter your Canvas dashboard. To do that, go to https://pccsk12.instructure.com/courses and click on the star next to the courses you want to be visible on the dashboard. Leave any courses you don’t want to see unfilled. When you return to the dashboard, only the course with filled stars will be visible.

🌟🌟🌟BONUS Tip: You can drag and drop the course tiles on your dashboard to rearrange them in any order you would like.

This fall, Canvas has rolled out a few great updates. Check them out below!

Custom Images in the Icon Maker

Earlier this year, Canvas launched an icon maker. It allows you to create custom images and buttons for  your course. The icons are saved in the course file and can be updated easily in one place. At first, the images to add to the icon were very limited, but Canvas now allows you to upload and edit an image. Here’s a video demonstrating the process.

 

Studio Video Editing

Basic cut and trim video editing options are available for Studio media. This update allows media owners to easily edit media within Studio itself, rather than having to edit media in a third-party editing software. Take a closer look here.

 

Schedule Page Publishing (coming 10/15)

You will have the option to schedule a date and time that page is published. Find more information here.

Whether you are new to crosslisting or have done it for awhile, review this list to help run it as efficiently as possible. Crosslisting should only be done at the beginning of a term (prior to any student submissions so to avoid their loss).

Be Sure To:

• Keep “People” hidden on the Course Navigation Menu to protect student privacy
• Change the course name so students don’t get confused if their scheduled section meets at a different time
• If you want to use discussions, set it up as a group discussion so students are only interacting with people in their section

Streamline Your Workflow:

• You can assign things (especially quizzes) per section to customize availability times and due dates
• You can sort Speedgrader submissions by section
• You can sort the Gradebook by section

Canvas Crosslisting Tips by Kaelyn Bullock

Please submit a tech ticket if you have additional questions.

Please note that each teacher must manually publish the course(s) they want to be visible to students.

Publishing your course only takes one click! From the Course Card on your Dashboard, click “Publish” (see screenshot below).

Alternatively, you can open the course home page and click the “Publish” button on the right side of the screen (see screenshot below).

 

Rest assured, students will not be able to access the course until the term start date. You can verify this under the course Settings (and adjust if desired).

As a reminder, your courses in MISTAR have been auto-populated in Canvas and auto-rostered with students. These are the course(s) you should publish and actively use with students. Any manually created courses should either be copied or cross-listed with your auto-populated courses. You can also cross-list multiple sections of the same course following the instructions provided in one of our previous posts.

We are happy to offer Canvas Open Office Hours. Please feel free to pop into the Zoom on Wednesday afternoon (August 31 from 12:00-2:00 PM) to get your Canvas questions answered. Your three district Technology Integration Specialists will be on hand to support you.

Topics might include:

• Importing content from previous years https://links.pccsk12.com/import
• Cross-listing your courses
• Working with the new template
• Setting up your absence support

Use this link to add it to your calendar and the Zoom link. We hope to see you Wednesday!

Your Canvas Course Template is here! As you may have read in our previous communication, your Technology Integration Specialists have created a template for Canvas that you will see as soon as you open any Canvas courses that sync with MiStar for this year. We hope it will take one thing off your long to-do lists.

A communication was sent on 8/23/22 about how to customize it and add your content from previous years. Those resources can be found on our website: https://tech.pccsk12.com/canvas-lms/canvas-course-templates/

If you prefer your own materials or want to import content from previous years, please follow these directions. https://links.pccsk12.com/import

Please submit a ticket if you have any questions.