The default Canvas course template for the University of Alberta was created in consultation with the Office of the Provost (Teaching & Learning) and the Centre for Teaching and Learning. The template presents a model of the best practices in course design in Canvas and is the recommended design for structuring your online course.

When you create a new course in Canvas, you will notice that some parts of the course are hidden from student view, as indicated by the eye icon with a stroke through it, especially Assignments and Quizzes. Instead of making these parts of your course visible, we recommend linking Quizzes and Assignments in Modules so that you can design how the delivery of your course proceeds.

Additionally, you can set completion requirements and prerequisites through Modules.

Other items that can be linked in Modules include files, pages, discussions, text headers, external URLs and external tools. You could have students proceed through your course step-by-step, view a video of a lesson or lecture, or take an assigned reading before attempting a quiz.

By using Modules, you will not have to ask your students to figure out what they should be doing next, given the lists of quizzes, readings, videos, and assignments. They could simply pick up where they left off.

More importantly, you would not have to work out a complex grade weighting scheme that also tries to accommodate the order in which content is delivered.

Linked course materials in Modules

When you create a Quiz or Assignment in Canvas, it is automatically linked to the Assignments part of your course. Because it is a hyperlink, you can edit the quiz or assignment by clicking on it in Assignments or Quizzes. Similarly, if it is linked to a Module, you can edit it there, too.

Adding modules

To add a Module, click the +Module button at the top of the course Modules page:

You can choose your own naming conventions. For example, if you are delivering course content step-by-step, you can use module names such as "Week 1" or "Topic 1: Course Outline" or "First Readings."

Adding content to modules

To add content to a module, click the plus-sign to the right of the Module title:

From the dropdown menu on the next dialogue box, you can select to add an assignment, a quiz or other course elements: 

When you select the content type you want added, you will have the option to create new content or link existing items in the course

Assigning modules

You can assign modules to everyone, to individual students, to groups and to course section. To assign a module, clci the three dost beside the module toitle and select Assign To:

Requirements and Prerequisites 

Requirements specify which items or activities a student needs to complete for the entire module to be considered complete. You can also use requirements to force students to complete a module sequentially.

Modules with prerequisites require students to complete previous modules before accessing the new content.

To access the Requirements and Prerequisites settings for a module, click the three dots menu beside the module title and select Edit:

For more information on requirements and prerequisites, see Restricting Access to Content in Canvas.