All instructors and staff can access the U of A’s Canvas instance at https://canvas.ualberta.ca. Users will need to sign in with their CCIDs to access their courses. All use of Canvas is governed by the Campus Computing Use policy. 

This article describes non-Bear Tracks courses: sandboxes and co-curriculars. Instructors can now request their credit courses on Canvas which will link them to Bear Tracks enrollment sections for the desired term. 

Canvas Sneak Peek Sandboxes

In preparation for the Canvas Sneak Peek, instructors have automatically been provided a personal sandbox in Canvas that has the new U of A content template applied. This template content has been created by instructional designers and includes text placeholders and a bank of U of A graphics. The template is designed to model an effective layout for course delivery and provide instructors with prompts that make customizing course content easy and efficient. 

Instructors will find an invitation to join their sandbox on the Canvas Dashboard when they sign in which they can Accept or clear by simply entering the course:

 For guidance on using your Sandbox, please see Getting Started on Canvas.

Creating Sandbox Courses on Canvas

Any instructors or staff can request as many Canvas sandbox courses as they require using the standard Course Request System. This process can also be used to create any additional sandbox courses that instructors require for content development of Fall 2024 courses. Any content developed in a sandbox course can be imported into a credit section after the full Canvas release in Summer 2024.

All Sandbox Courses contain the U of A's custom-designed template. Users who need a blank course can request a Co-curricular course.

To request a sandbox, click on Request a Canvas Course under the 'Resources' tab from the Canvas global nav:

From the Course Request System landing page, select Request on Canvas:

Then select the Sandbox Course option and click Next near the bottom right:

Users can then enter a name for the course in the textbox provided to complete their request:

Creating Co-Curricular Courses on Canvas

As of August 28, 2024, instructors and staff can now request Co-Curricular courses on Canvas using the request system. These courses are not automatically linked to any Bear Tracks enrollment sections and would be used for student cohort training needs, student pre-laboratory access training, internal faculty or staff training and professional development courses.

At this time, manual enrolment of students will be required for these courses.

To request co-curriculars, select that tile from the Canvas request landing page:

Enter the required information - a course title, a contact phone number in case of issues, and the affiliated college, faculty, department or unit; then specify the content source: the U of A Template, a blank course, or any existing Canvas course content to be initially copied into the course. (This would be the mechanism to copy in any content already created in a sandbox staging course or a course migrated by K16.)

Deleting Template Content

If you want to remove the template content from a sandbox or co-curricular course, you will have to delete it manually. This process should take about 5 minutes. 

It is also now possible to simply request a new blank co-curricular course to meet this need (see above.)

1. Go to Assignments in the left-hand navigation menu. This page will have most of the assignments, including quizzes and discussions, so you can click on the menu button to the right of an assignment group and choose Delete. 
   
   
   
   You will then be asked if you want to "Delete its assignments". Select that and then click on Delete Group.
   
   
   
   Note: You need at least one Assignment Group, so you cannot delete the last group. You will instead have to click on the menu icon next to the assignment itself and choose Delete.
   
   
2. Next, go to the Pages section in the left-hand navigation menu. It will show the Front Page of the course first, so click on the View All Pages button at the top. 
   
   
   
   
   You can then select all of the pages and click on the trash icon at the top-right to delete all of the pages.
   
   
   
   Note: The Home Page is acting as the Front Page, so in order to delete it, you must first click on the menu icon to the right of the Home Page and choose Remove as Front Page.
   
   
   
   
3. Go into the Modules section in the left-hand navigation menu. You can click on the menu icon to the right of the modules and choose Delete.
   
   
   
   
4. Go to the Files section in the left-hand navigation menu. You will see three folders there. You can click on the menu icon to the right of the folder and click on Delete to remove the folder and its contents.
   
   

This article lists the available training tools and support resources for Canvas. Please note that all of the vendor-supplied support materials, available as a part of the LMS transition, cover all of Canvas’ products and different use cases so are not limited to the U of A nor will they necessarily reflect the customizations made for our institution.

Instructors should get started by requesting a sandbox course, ensure they check into the Key Changes in Canvas that we have identified as a part of the transition, and sign up for one of the Center for Teaching and Learning Canvas Learning Opportunities. 

New User Tutorial

For any initial questions that users run into, a good first resource is the in-system New User Tutorial which appears any time a new page is launched. These overlays contain context-sensitive details on the page where they are found and links to more detailed guides on the Canvas support portal. If the tutorial on a page is not visible, it can be launched via the icon at the top right of the page:

If you permanently remove the tutorial, you can re-enable it within your account settings.

Canvas Video Guides

The entire library of Canvas video guides for instructors is available at https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Video-Guide/tkb-p/videos#instructor-videos.

Note: If a video linked from that page gives an "Access Denied" error, this is likely Canvas archiving the video guide to be replaced with updated information

You can also find resources for getting started in Canvas under the Instructor Getting Started Resources page.

Canvas Self-Paced Training Courses

Users can access the custom Canvas Training Courses from within the system Resources for more in-depth training, including self-paced courses and webinars. To access, these training courses, users must first sign in to Canvas and then click on Resources, then Canvas Training Courses:

Next, search for the particular title you are interested in. Choose the Higher Education tab to get the most out of the Training Portal.

Scroll down to find the recommended courses in the Building Block Basics section of the portal page. The following courses are highly recommended, but it is well worth exploring the entire set of offerings:

• Canvas Field Guide (34 minutes) - Quick navigation and facilitation guide
• Creating Canvas Courses (18 minutes) - covers the main options
• Canvas Mobile App (24 minutes) - describes the separate apps for students and instructors available via Google Play Store and the Apple Store
• Getting Started with Assignments and Assessments (17 minutes) - creating, configuring, and weighting assignments
• Best Practices for Course Design
• New Quizzes Essentials (90 minutes)
• Grading and Feedback (42 minutes) - using Rubrics, Gradebook, and the SpeedGrader™
• Opening Canvas (20 minutes) - covers account notifications, the Dashboard, Calendar, Inbox, and Announcements
  Creating a Canvas Course (70 minutes)- covers home pages, navigation, the Rich Content Editor (RCE), Modules, and the student view
• Canvas Commons (36 Minutes) - content and courses shared by Canvas users
• Canvas Studio Training (90 minutes) - an alternative similar to YuJa

Other Canvas Training Resources for Instructors

In addition to the Canvas Training Courses, instructors can also find answers in the public Canvas Resources for Instructors course. In the default Canvas course template (provided in every Sandbox), click on Modules, then Canvas Resources for Instructors:

Then click on the image below:

If the Canvas Resources for Instructors, is not in the your course (for example if you have reset the template or requested a blank course), you can access it at https://design.instructure.com/courses/221. This Instructor Resource Course provides instructors with the resources they need to use Canvas successfully. The course includes videos, help articles, guides, and detailed instructions, including:

 Getting Started

• Canvas system overview
• Canvas Calendar overview - add content and allow students to set office appointments
• Course Navigation
• The Canvas Teacher App
• The Canvas Student App
• Files - adding, storing, and using files in a course
• Modules - structuring your course content delivery
• Pages - setting up a course home page
• The Rich Content Editor - for adding and formatting instructions and content to quizzes and assignments
• Creating Announcements
• Getting Notifications of class communications and course changes
• User Settings – an overview

Assignments, Discussions, and Quizzes

• Assignments overview
• Discussions overview
• Quizzes overview

Gradebook, Rubrics, and SpeedGrader™

• Gradebook overview
• Rubrics overview
• SpeedGrader™ - the manual grading interface

During the LMS transition when students may be taking courses on both LMSs, instructors also have a few options to ensure their students can access their course. 

Adjusting Course Start and End Times

Basic student access to Canvas credit courses is controlled by adjusting the Course Access Dates. These dates are set during the course request process which creates courses in the published state. The access dates can also be viewed and changed in the course settings:

Hiding Content Under Construction

Instructors may come across Canvas documentation referring to a Publish/Unpublish toggle for entire courses. Instructors will never need to Publish/Unpublish their entire course as this is handled by the course request system. Canvas Publish/Unpublish should not be considered as an equivalent to eClass's Show/Hide functionality since courses cannot be unpublished as soon as any submission has been graded.

Instead of hiding the entire courses during construction, instructors should instead build content in an unpublished module(s). Activities with timing elements like access dates, or visibility settings need to be set to hidden from students during construction until ready for release.

See this article on how to publish/unpublish modules and items within Canvas courses.

Guiding Students to Access Canvas Courses

During the LMS transition, there may be student confusion about where to locate their course online. Instructors can use any or all of the following options below to ensure that students know where to find their course if it is on the new LMS.

1) Add a link to their Canvas Course in Bear Tracks.

To do this instructors need to sign in to Bear Tracks and access their Instructor Centre tile to view their course schedule, then click on the Assign Webpage icon beside the class:

They can then select the Custom URL checkbox and enter their direct Canvas course link as a 'Custom url' - this can equally be done to provide a direct link to an eClass course if desired:

Entering a custom url in this field will display the link on the student's expanded view in their Bear Tracks schedule:

Any instructors encountering issues with this process can check the RO Instructor resources for guidance or contact the course scheduler for their department with additional questions.

2) Create an empty course shell in eClass that contains only a link to their Canvas course. 

The same Bear Tracks course can be requested in either Canvas or eClass so links to the appropriate system could be added to the LMS not being used.

3) Post regular announcements from Canvas.

Just like in eClass, course announcements send email notifications by default to all students in a course. Posting messages early in the term reminding students of their course's online location and including links to important course information in the messages will ensure students are accessing in the correct place.

Instructors are now able to request their Bear Tracks credit courses for Canvas at https://cc.cloud.eclass.ualberta.ca/. This process uses the same system and is analogous to what instructors have used to create courses on eClass. The request system allows instructors to combine different section types (lectures, labs, seminars, etc) and terms (fall, winter etc) to meet their needs. Instructors and U of A staff can also request and create Co-Curricular or Sandbox courses using the same system.

This process must be completed for every course and for every term the course will be delivered.

As this is the first release of the request system for our new LMS, instructors should ensure they check the latest known issues below and report any issues encountered to eClass support. 

System Details

Any U of A faculty or staff with a valid CCID can request courses on Canvas; students are not able to use the system. (If an instructor or staff member has a recent student Bear Tracks enrollment using their CCID account, they will need to contact eClass support to be permitted to make requests.)

The request system is populated every two hours with the latest course and section information in Bear Tracks. By default, instructors will be shown any current term courses where they are enrolled as an instructor but they can also search the subject and code for any courses required.

If users cannot locate a section they are trying to request, they should consult with their department to check if or when it was added to Peoplesoft. If a section is not in Bear Tracks it cannot be requested in Canvas.

Sections can only be requested a single time to maintain enrollment mappings so users may encounter the following alert beside a section:

This commonly means that there has been an instructor change in Bear Tracks after the section was initially requested. If this occurs during a request, please contact eClass support so we can contact the original requester and resolve the issue. 

Requesting Courses

Instructors need to select the term, course letter code, course number/name, and then click on the desired section or mouseover and click enter to select it:

Once one section is added, it will appear below the search box as the student enrollment source for the new course:

Additional sections can be added to create a combined course by going back up into the drodown boxes, re-sorting to a different course if necessary, and then selecting those. They will then appear in the course enrollments list:

Once all required sections have been added, the next screen allows instructors to make any required name changes to the course and they can either elect to copy content from one of their existing Canvas sandboxes or staging courses, create the course blank, or select a course containing the U of A custom-designed template that they can begin adding content to:

Note: If you have created multiple sandbox courses and you wish to copy content from one, it may be hard to distinguish one from the other. If so, you can click on the Settings link at the bottom left of your sandbox course, and on the Course details page, alter the Name: field to something easier to identify (e.g., change 'dlaurie Sandbox' to 'dlaurie Sandbox for ANTHR 110').

On the next 2 screens, instructors can add any additional instructors or TAs, and then set the dates the students will gain and lose access to the course. These settings can also be changed directly in Canvas after courses are created. The dates set here are the ONLY mechanism available to control student access to courses - there is no need to Publish credit courses as they are created in a published state and kept closed using access dates.

Once requested, instructors will receive a course that should appear on Canvas, typically within 15 minutes. Student cohorts are added to courses during the next enrollment sync run which runs every 5 hours. Course enrollments are updated for students adding or dropping courses every subsequent sync run.

When starting to work in Canvas, we recommend that instructors:

• Ensure they understand the Key Changes when migrating from eClass to Canvas.
• Review the Default Course Settings and make any necessary changes.
• If starting from an empty (template) course, consult Adding Content To Courses

Course Request Known Issues

This article provide details on the mass migration of course content from eClass to Canvas as a part of the U of A's LMS transition project.  Instructors and TAs can learn the next steps they need to follow once they receive their converted course(s) starting in November.

The mass migration is only available for courses from Winter 2023, Fall 2023, Winter 2024, Spring 2024, Summer 2024, Fall 2024, and Winter 2025. Courses prior to Winter 2023 will not be migrated.

Update May 9th, 2025: All courses from the second round of migrations (Fall 2024) are complete. Anyone who still does not see all their migrated courses should contact eClass support. The final Winter 2025 term run is underway.

Update August 8, 2025: The K16 migration project is complete with the vendor signing off on all migrations. Any instructors who are missing content should consult eClass support.

Step 1: Review Migrated eClass Course Content

All migrated courses will appear on instructors' dashboards when they first sign into Canvas. Users who have multiple migrated courses may want to customize the course tiles to more easily distinguish between them.

Instructors must thoroughly review migrated content before using it. Given the breadth of content types and delivery options possible in eClass, some course migrations will be straightforward, and others will require more work to rebuild in Canvas. 

Locate Content

The standard eClass view of an eClass course page is rebuilt in the Modules area of Canvas courses. Instructors should click there first to review their content sections, headings, and all course content, files, links, and activities.

Each module in Canvas maps to the source content section (topic, week, etc) from the eClass course. One major difference immediately apparent is that the Canvas module view does not allow large blocks of inline text or any embedded media. If your eClass course contained rich content in the section headings or in Text and Media areas (formerly Labels), this has been converted to Canvas pages in the migrated course and positioned in the module where it appeared in the original section. These items must be clicked to be viewed.

Content from section headings appears first in the new Module with ' - Section Summary' appended to the title. If a course used shorter Text and Media/Labels in topics as sub-headings these are converted into Canvas text headers and any indentation from the original course will be copied across.

Review the Content Mapping and Conversion Chart

At this stage, if your course uses only basic content types (files, pages, discussions, links, etc) or in-page section content, you may now be ready to begin using your content. This would be a good opportunity to review your course using this accessibility checklist provided by Canvas and reviewed by U of A staff.

Instructors using more complex content types should review the eClass to Canvas Content Conversion Mapping to determine if any content in their course needs further attention. That article has additional notes for advanced instructions for rebuilding content in Canvas. Any items that have no possible alternatives in Canvas are migrated with 'STUB:' prepended to their name and provide a link back to eClass for instructors to review the source course.

To further validate how content has been migrated, K16 provides instructors an exception log identifying anything the automatic migration process could not handle. This can be found in converted courses by clicking Pages > All Pages > and location the item(s) called 000-Migration Exception Log:

The Exception Log creates an entry for every eClass feature that does not translate to Canvas, so it can get lengthy. Reviewing this page is not required in all cases, but the Exception Log can be a useful tool to validate that content is not 'left behind' in eClass, notably incompatible quiz questions. The log provides direct links for instructors to access the original content easily (but URLs in the exception log are added after the K16 automated run, so they point to the migration server and must be edited to point at production if instructors are using them to validate missing content):

Step 2: Copy the Migrated Content into a New Course  

Once instructors have thoroughly reviewed their content, there are 2 main ways to use mass-migrated courses:

1) by requesting them as the content source when making a Canvas credit course request in the same way they would use content from a past term's eClass course, or a staging/sandbox course. Or:

2) by using them as content repositories and pulling content - or specific pieces of content - into credit courses using Canvas' native content import process. Note that there is a documented issue when copying new quizzes (the format that quizzes have been migrated in) between courses- they must be imported along with a module rather than directly from the quizzes area in the migrated course. More details can be found in the linked content import article. 

In either case, instructors should review the course configuration guidelines in Step 3) before releasing a course to students. 

Note: it is not possible to use a migrated AS a credit course without moving the content since student enrollments are only added to courses once they are created through the Course Request System.

Step 3: Configure the New Course

In addition to ensuring their content has migrated, instructors have a couple more things to do in Canvas to prepare their courses. (This is in addition to the standard tasks instructors need to do when rolling courses forward from past terms: ensuring the correct content is visible, updating the syllabus, adjusting dates on assignments and materials, setting up any access requirements or accommodations, etc.)

Customize the home page of a course

Migrated courses all contain a pared-down version of the U of A's custom template which adds a polished, visual front page that instructors can opt to use as a course landing page with links to other areas of the course. The home page is easily edited using the Canvas Rich-Content Editor to change links (and remove the migration warning text). Included with the pared-down template are some additional graphics assets instructors can use to customize the look and feel from the Files area of the course.

One major improvement in the Canvas RCE is that it is very easy to add links in pages to anywhere else in your Canvas course -- other pages, modules, files, etc -- to serve as a landing page. The existing navigation buttons/links can be used for this purpose and connected to the correct items in a course easily using the RCE.

If instructors are interested, the full version of the template can be explored further in any sandbox course -- it contains some additional design and formatting elements that instructors may want to incorporate into their course design.

New for November 2024, U of A Digital + Creative has also released a repository of faculty and department-specific banners and course card graphics for instructor use through the Canto digital asset management tool (requires CCID sign-in):

• • • Graphics course banners for courses in Canvas
    • Graphics course cards for courses in Canvas

Instructors can also choose not to use a visual course home page and instead set the modules page as the student landing page for a course.

Configure the Course Navigation Items for the Course

Content in Canvas can also be accessed through the left-hand navigation menu, where content is sorted by type. The recommended practice is for instructors to keep those navigation elements hidden from students and structure course content progression through modules. Using modules allows instructors to use completion requirements to set up course pacing and provides built-in navigation for students. Instructors can always access content from the left nav even if the items are hidden from students.

The migration template has the navigation elements configured in line with this practice and prevents student access to the Assignments, Discussions, Quizzes, Files, and Pages by default (as indicated by the crossed-eyeball.) In addition, several more advanced tools are disabled by default - Collaborations, Rubrics, and Outcomes. Instructors can enable any of these tools for particular use cases or re-order the visible options in the course settings under the Navigation section.

The left nav also contains several links to external tools which can be enabled or disabled in the course settings. (A good example of this would be to hide the Zoom nav element in courses that do not require online meetings). It is important to note that some of the nav links are instructor-only by default and are not indicated by closed eyeballs (eg. Item Banks.) Instructors should always use the View as student button near the top right to confirm what students are seeing in the left nav: 

Set up the Course Gradebook

Gradebooks in Canvas are somewhat less complex than in eClass but if instructors are using the gradebook to record student assessment scores and calculate marks, there are a number of important differences to be aware of when setting up gradebooks in Canvas. These changes are covered in detail in Using the Gradebook in Canvas. 

Most importantly, by default in Canvas, any entered grades are visible by default. Instructors must follow these instructions to change this behaviour if they want to release grades in bulk after review.

In Canvas all course totals are calculated using the sum of the total points for each assessment item shown in a percentage or as a letter (what was called the Simple Weighted Mean of Grades aggregation method in eClass.) If a gradebook requires that some items are given different weights (ie. the Weighted Mean of Grades aggregation method in eClass), these need to be set under the Assignments nav item by creating Assignment Groups where weights can be entered. 

Any native assessment items (assignments, quizzes, graded forums) and manual gradebook columns from the source eClass course are automatically added to the Canvas gradebook via the K16 migration. In addition, if the eClass gradebook had any weighted items, assignment groups are automatically created for these in Canvas (including advanced scoring options like 'Drop the lowest') and any assessment items are placed in the correct group. (However due to Canvas' built-in gradebook sorting methods, the K16 migration can not recreate the exact order of items in the Canvas gradebook.) 

Preparing Migrated Quizzes

Instructors who used eClass quizzes will have those quizzes in their Canvas migrations but these must be thoroughly reviewed before delivering them to students. For basic multiple choice, short answer, or essay question quizzes, the migration fidelity is reasonable but there are some specific changes with the canvas quiz that instructors should take special note of:

1. Showing/Hiding Quiz Results: By default, Canvas quizzes are open for students to review as soon as they are completed. Instructors who want to hold quizzes back during flexible block exams and/or while reviewing questions and grades need to adjust 2 settings.

2. Text blocks within quizzes: Instructors who used the 'Description' type question in eClass will need to rebuild those questions using the New Quiz Text Block feature. This is new functionality that only arrived in Canvas in summer 2025, after the K16 migration was completed. Text descriptions from eClass were migrated via K16 as incomplete stimulus questions to preserve the text but this text needs to be copy and pasted into a new text block. Any quizzes where this is not done will not function.

3. Inadvertent answer shuffling: Multiple choice questions that were migrated from eClass will sometimes have their answers shuffled, even if they didn't shuffle on the eClass quiz. This occurs because in an eClass quiz, answer shuffling required that the quiz-level setting "Shuffle within questions" was switched on, as well as having "Shuffle the choices" checked for the specific questions. In Canvas, there is no quiz-level setting and only a setting at the question-level to  "Shuffle Choices." Any question that had "Shuffle the choices" checked in eClass, regardless of whether that was turned on for an entire quiz, will have "Shuffle Choices" checked in Canvas. Instructors using answer prompts like "only A & C" or "All of the above" must take care when reviewing quizzes and edit those questions in the quiz (uncheck "Shuffle Choices".)

Instructors who are using more complex eClass quiz question types need to review the eClass to Canvas content conversion for quizzes. Note that when reviewing questions in Canvas, it is not possible to preview a single question at a time. So if instructors are pulling random questions from item banks in Canvas (a feature which does migrate), they will need to build 'complete item bank' quizzes to review all questions.

Additional Migration Project Details

The U of A mass migration is being delivered via K16, an external vendor with extensive experience migrating content into Canvas. During summer 2024, a number of sample courses containing a wide range of eClass content types, layouts, and activities were converted initially using a manual backup method. K16 then used a custom automated process map and rebuild the sample course content into Canvas.

The content owners of the sample courses then went through an iterative review process to identify areas where the K16 process could better map content features or specific settings from their courses to matching features in Canvas. The end result of the review is a dedicated mass migration algorithm that will be applied in bulk to eClass credit courses to bring them across into our new LMS. This migration run will provide the highest fidelity of content transfer to minimize the work instructors will need to do to rebuild courses in Canvas.

The migration details are:

• Anyone who was enrolled as an Instructor in the original eClass course will be enrolled as a Teacher in the new Canvas course.
• Mass migrated courses will appear on enrolled instructor's dashboards with the same title as on eClass, prepended with 'eClass Content Migration:'.
• Due to site performance impacts and data privacy requirements, the vendor's service was connected to a clone of eClass. Instructors who feel like they are missing content or enrollments in courses should contact eClass support as this may have impacted their migration. 
• No student enrollments or student data from courses are included in the migration.
• Non-BearTracks eClass courses or courses delivered outside the specified credit-course terms can be migrated to Canvas manually.
• Migrated courses contain a pared-down version of the U of A Content Template containing only the custom-designed home page.
• There is no requirement that instructors use their migrated courses in the Winter 2025 term on Canvas - courses can still be requested on eClass normally up until the Summer 2025 term; after that point all new courses must be created on Canvas.

This article describes how instructors can add the new Approved Student Accommodations Dashboard external tool to their courses. This tool provides a convenient listing of any students who are approved for academic accommodations for a particular course detailing the specific exams the students have registered for and the specific accommodations required. Course-level accommodation will be added at a later date.

This custom tool, developed as a collaboration between eClass and the Academic Success Centre, is being released for Fall 2025 as an open beta, so feedback is welcome. Please note: Accommodation dashboard information is confidential and is intended for the sole use of instructional staff who require the information in order to facilitate students’ accommodations and should not be distributed in any form.

Adding the Approved Student Accommodation Dashboard to Canvas

In Canvas, instructors can select the accommodation dashboard from the list of external tools available when adding content and then click Add Item to add the tool into a module:

By default, this tool is unpublished for student access and it should be left that way. (The tool will display an error if students try to access it.)

Viewing Accommodation Information

Once the external tool has been added, any instructor in the course can open the dashboard by clicking the link on the course modules page where it was added:

The new display of the dashboard contains different tabs for student's exam accommodations and their overall course accommodations. Exam accommodation appears on the main tab with each student and registered exam appearing on the left along side the specific accommodations entered for that exam on the right:

Important note: as of Friday August 22, 2025, the data for the course accommodations tab is currently being restructured by the vendor. Clicking on that tab will show an alert for instructors and a direct link to the Accommodate system where they can validate course-level accommodations:

In New quizzes, the regrading method will vary by question type, with some questions allowing corrections to the points and answer choices and others allowing corrections to the points only. If you are using Classic quizzes (not recommended), you can regrade only Multiple-Choice, Multiple-Answer, and True/False questions after supplying the corrected answer choice and/or changing the question's point value (if required). 

Regrading is not available for Essay or File Upload questions in either quiz type. 
 

Regrading New Quiz Questions

Question regrades are triggered through the SpeedGrader -- either from the course Quizzes page or from within the gradebook -- or from the Moderate page in the quiz build area. Regrading any question for a single student will regrade that question for all the students who have taken the quiz. (Instructors who need individual students to have different scores on a quiz can change their scores on questions or use Fudge points.)

Access from the gradebook main page:

Open the Grades tab, go to the SpeedGrader for the item you wish to regrade:

Access from an individual student's grades view:

Open the Grades tab and click on the individual grade for the student and the item you wish to regrade:

In the modal that opens on the right edge of the page, click on the SpeedGrader™ button for the individual student:

Access from the Quizzes page:

Open the Quizzes tab in the course left nav area then click the 3 dots then Speedgrader:

Access from the Moderate page:

Within the quiz Build page, click on Moderate, then on the attempt of a particular student:

Changing Scores or Regrading:

All the pathways shown above will open the quiz on a particular student's quiz attempt. To change the answers or points for the entire class, click on Regrade in any required question and make changes - either by changing the correct answer (if the option is available) and/or the points value (if required). To change an individual student score, adjust any question's points dropdown:

If choosing to regrade the entire class's submissions, make the points or answer changes to the question:

Then click Regrade near the bottom right:

Next select an option from the Regrade Options:

Additional Notes:

• Awarding points for only the correct answer may reduce some students' scores. For a detailed explanation of the possible effects of regrading choices, see: How do I regrade a quiz question in New Quizzes?
• If a quiz question has inadvertently been created with more than one correct answers, but only one selction has been allowed, you can select the alternative answer in SpeedGrader then select the regrade option "Award points for both current and previous answers."
• There can sometimes be a delay from an hour to 24 hours after regrading for all instances of students quiz scores to be updated, especially in large classes.

Question Type Regrading Options

• Multiple choice question - points and answer choice correction
• Multiple answer - points and answer choice correction
• Fill in the blank - points and answer choice correction
• True/False - points and answer choice correction
• Hotspot - points and answer selection area correction
• Numeric - points and answer choice correction
• Categorisaton - points only
• Formula - points only
• Ordering - points only
• Essay - regrading not possible
• File Upload - regrading not possible

Regrade Classic Quiz Questions

Classic quiz regrade only works with specific quiz question types and only applies to students who have already taken the quiz.

Currently, Classic quiz regrade is available for Multiple Choice, True/False, and Multiple Answers question types.

• Learn how to regrade Multiple Choice Questions
• Learn how to regrade True/False questions
• Learn how to regrade Multiple-answer questions

Adding or removing a question does not trigger the quiz regrade feature. Additionally, changing the point value for a quiz question does not trigger a quiz regrade; the student's submitted quiz will show the updated point value, but the current grade won't change in the Gradebook. If you have edited your quiz in one of these three ways, you should moderate the quiz and let the student retake the quiz.

Important note: Updating a question for regrade changes the question in the quiz. It does not change the question in a question bank.

1. To change any Multiple Choice, Multiple Answer, or True/False question, open the quiz:

2. Click on the Questions tab:

3. Click the pencil icon to edit the question:

4. When you click to select the corrected answer, the green arrow will move, and you will be presented with the regrade options:

The options may be slightly different depending on the question type. For a detailed explanation of the possible effects of regrading choices, see: What options can I use to regrade a quiz in a course?

5. Click Update to update the question.

Grading by Question using the SpeedGrader

Instructors grading (or checking) essay questions through the speedgrader can configure their display to grade the same question for every student in a row. 

1. Go to the SpeedGrader for the quiz and click on the Gear on the left for Options.

2. Toggle the Grade by Question option. You may have to switch between the new and old SpeedGrader to see the option update.

3. Save the Settings.

Grading the quiz will contain an option to choose the question itself and will allow graders to grade and proceed by student under the same question.

For more information about using the SpeedGrader to grade one question at a time, please see the following Instructure Articles for more details:

• https://community.instructure.com/en/kb/articles/661187-how-do-i-grade-one-quiz-question-at-a-time-in-speedgrader
• https://community.instructure.com/en/kb/articles/661188-how-do-i-grade-a-new-quizzes-quiz-question-one-at-a-time-in-speedgrader

Accessing the Dashboard

When you first log into Canvas, the Dashboard is the first thing you will see with courses displayed by default in a Card view. If you navigate away from the Dashboard, you can return at any time by clicking the Dashboard link in the left navigation menu:

On the right side of the Dashboard page, there is the To Do list and list of upcoming events and a link to view your personal Canvas Calendar:

Note: The bottom of the To Do list has a button to access assigned grades.

Course cards will contain buttons to access recent notifications of announcements, assignments, discussions and course page changes:

Support Callout Blocking Your View? Low-resolution screens will show the Support Callout floating on top of the Global Navigation buttons on the left. If deemed obstructive, you can minimize the Global Navigation buttons by clicking on the icon at the bottom. From this: To this:

Customizing course cards

Both students and instructors can customize the theme colour of a course card. Both can also give the course a nickname to make the course easier to identify, and these changes will only be seen by the student or instructor making the changes:

If you wish to have a clearer view of your course thumbnail image, you can click to disable the Color Overlay via the top right three dots dropdown menu:

Note: Instructors can change the course thumbnail image in the main course Settings under Course Details.

Moving and sorting course cards

Course cards can be moved and sorted in two ways. The first is from the three dots menu for the card:

You can also drag and drop course cards:

Changing the Dashboard view

The three dots menu near the top right of the Dashboard allows you to change from Card view to List view or Recent Activity:

In List view, the Dashboard displays courses sorted by date order of the various activities inside each course. Users can also view grades, notifications, and whether activities have been graded or missed, and whether there are replies to comments on an activity.

Note: List View is only available for users who are enrolled as a student in at least one course.

In Recent Activity view, you will see a list of the courses with recent events. You can expand the Show More dropdown to get a list of specific activities:

Customizing displayed courses on the Dashboard

The Dashboard displays a maximum of twenty courses. New enrollments will no longer appear afterward and would require the following.

You can customize your course list by accessing Courses from the left-nav and clicking on All Courses.

Click on a star to add it to Favorites, which will update your list to display only Favorited courses.

Courses not Favorited, can still be accessed from the All Courses list.

This article provides the basic details for enabling and using LockDown Browser and Monitor, along with links to vendor-provided documentation and training materials.
 

Getting Started

Instructors intending to use Respondus should make sure they aware of all the general recommendations for Delivering Exams Remotely and should also Register their Online Exams with eClass support to avoid any potential problems.

For an overview of Respondus LockDown Browser and Monitor, instructors can view the vendor-provided video Introduction to Respondus LockDown Browser and Monitor. Instructors should also be aware of the system requirements for using Lockdown browser which are also linked in the Lockdown Browser Usage Guide for Students that instructors are encouraged to provide to their students as a link in their Canvas courses. The limitations and known issues for Respondus are documented in a restricted-access google doc available only to instructors -- users will need to request access which will be granted once instructor status is confirmed.

We strongly urge instructors to add a Respondus-enabled practice exam to your course and provide an alternative option to mitigate exam-day issues (such as a pre-built exam copy that requires no monitoring.) This guideline applies even when delivering exams in an on-campus computer lab so that students are familiar with that environment. 

Instructors can view what students experience when using Respondus LockDown Browser/Monitor. When running BYOD exams, instructors should remind students to use the EduRoam (preferred) or UWS networks and not the Guest@UofA network as that is known to drop connections and can cause students to lose answers or submissions. 

To use either Respondus LockDown Browser or Respondus Monitor, instructors must first enable the tool in their course navigation by opening the course Settings, then the Navigation tab, then clicking Enable beside LockDown Browser, and finally clicking Save at the bottom of the page:

The LockDown Browser nav item will now display and can be used to add security and monitoring to an exam:

Enabling LockDown Browser or Monitor for a Quiz

When first accessing the tool, instructors will need to authorize the tool:

The LockDown Browser Dashboard will then display all the New or Classic Quizzes in the Canvas course and display which, if any, of the 2 Respondus options are already enabled for a quiz:

Once enabled on a quiz, any students accessing the quiz will be redirected to a Respondus launch page guiding them on downloading and installing the application on their first launch. Subsequent launches should trigger an immediate launch of Respondus.

Enabling Monitor (Webcam and screen recording)

To enable security or monitoring for a quiz, click the dropdown caret to the left of the title as above and enter the Settings. Then toggle the option to Require LockDown to enable security and/or monitoring for each quiz that requires it:

Once Monitor is enabled (required), instructors can select whether to enable WebCam recording, Screen recording, or both:

These basic guidelines are also available in Respondus' introductory video Securing Canvas New Quizzes.

Advanced Features and Settings

• Reviewing Respondus Monitor Proctoring Data
• Delivering Exams on iPad
• Proctoring MS Word and MS Excel
• Requiring students to show their work
• Setting Up a Second Camera for a Respondus Monitor Exam
• Open Book Exams (see below)

For additional, detailed explanations of the advanced settings for LockDown Browser, users can view the Instructor FAQ and/or use the detailed documentation provided within the Respondus Dashboard via the Guides and Support tab at the top of the Dashboard:

Enabling External Web Access (Open Book Exams)

By default, all external web access is initially prohibited in Respondus LockDown Browser, and any existing web browsers will be closed when Respondus launches. Instructors who wish students to be able to access specific websites -- and those alone -- can configure this in the Respondus settings. This can provide monitoring for students and allow them web access, and is as close to a fully open-book exam that Respondus offers.

Some sites can be opened if the links in the quiz description can open in a new tab and if a website does not require navigation to another site or web page to open via a link in the page or via a login screen, students will be able to open the page. More details can be found in Accessing external web domains in LockDown Browser. 

Otherwise, whether you require recording the student's webcam or webcam and screen, you can allow navigation within specific sites to be visited, such as the course content within Canvas. If you are recording a student's webcam during Open book exams, Respondus recommends decreasing the sensitivity of the automatic face detection and/or disabling the handheld device check.

To set this up, first add a link to your course in the quiz description:

You will need a link for each allowed website. Include external links that are in your course such as e-textbook sites or other external sites. Note that students can only open 6 tabs for sites allowed in a Respondus session. If additional tabs are needed, students should close unused tabs and be allowed to navigate to the quiz description to access site links.

In addition, students cannot open the allowed tabs before they start the quiz or exam. It is recommended that instructors include a statement to that effect in the instructions, along these lines: 

Include in your instructions to students:

"Do not attempt to open allowed websites until you have completely set up Respondus LockDown browser.
To open links, right-click and choose Open link in new window."

Next, in the Respondus setup just above the Proctoring settings, click Advanced Settings:

Check the box to allow access to specific external web domains. Students can access their course materials if you have entered Canvas's full domain name, canvas.ualberta.ca.

Note: https://drive.google.com is a hyperlink. Its domain is drive.google.com.

To add allowed sites, separate domain names with a comma when you add them.

For students to be able to open links that they have closed, or if they need more than the maximum tabs allowed, be sure to set your quiz to allow students to return to the top of the quiz to find the allowed sites or links:

Setting up this type of exam is also described in this Respondus support article which also includes a link to a useful Chrome extension that can identify sub-urls from pages that would need to be added to the allowed domains list.

New in Spring 2026, when delivering monitored and restricted Respondus exams, instructors may need to add the Duo MFA web domain (api-7e870e0a.duosecurity.com/) to the list of exceptions if they have any students in their courses who are U of A staff or if the have opted-in to MFA.

Known Issues

It is always recommended for instructors to deliver practice Respondus exams and to prepare for exam-day issues by preparing an exam copy that does not require Respondus.

• Devices Not Exiting Respondus During Exams 

Some devices will not exit Respondus LockDown Browser once the exam is submitted. Students may have to force their device to shut down to exit while some devices cannot be forced to shut down while Respondus is running.

One way to avoid this issue is either to uncheck the setting "Lock students into the browser until exam is completed" (recommended) or else to set a password which can be offered to students who encounter issues:

• Quiz Title Changes

When Respondus is enabled on a quiz, the name of the quiz will have the words "Requires Resopndus Lockdown Browser" appended to it. This cannot be changed or removed. If the quiz name is changed, instructors will see the following when they access the Respondus Dashboard where the MUST click Fix it to re-enable Respondus on the quiz:

This same error appears on the Dashboard if you duplicate a quiz that has Respondus enabled. If instructors are setting up one in-person exam and one remotely monitored, the correct process is to duplicate the quiz BEFORE adding Respondus. This issue is also resolved by clicking the Fix It button. 

Note: If you enable and then disable the Respondus LockDown browser, you will not be able to re-enable it if the new quiz name exceeds 256 characters. It is advised that you edit the quiz name to remove the appended title, " - Requires Respondus LockDown Browser + Webcam," or " - Requires Respondus LockDown Browser." Without restoring the original quiz name, "Fix It" may not work.

• Respondus in on-campus Mac Labs

Some users encounter errors using Respondus Monitor in lab environments where the application does not detect that the screen recording permission is enabled for the application (even though it is.) Since users do not have administrator rights on the computer, they cannot complete the troubleshooting steps required (re-install the application and re-enable the permission.) 

This issue has been escalated to the vendor but until it is resolved, the Respondus application HAS BEEN REMOVED from the on-campus Mac labs.

• Chromebook Display Issues

On some models of Chromebook, the Respondus toolbar covers the quiz timer at the top of the Canvas page. The vendor is aware of this issue and is working towards a fix.

• Quiz opens without Respondus LockDown Browser

If the Respondus LockDown Browser setup has been copied from a previous course, Canvas will not recognize that Respondus LockDown is enabled in the course until its Dashboard has been opened. It is good practice to open the Dashboard to check the settings.

Reviewing Results with Respondus LockDown Browser

If you allow students to review their responses and the grades they received, they may encounter issues later when viewing their responses on quizzes where Respondus is enabled. Students will be able to view their responses in Respondus immediately after submitting their exam if they do not close Respondus (and you have the quiz configured that way.)

Once Respondus is closed, students will receive an error if they attempt to reopen Respondus unless a due date has been set in Canvas and has passed.

If you have allowed students to review their responses in your quiz setup, they will be able to view their results from the gradebook link only if you have set a due date and only if the due date has passed.

We do not recommend disabling Respondus in the Respondus quiz setup, as we cannot guarantee that proctoring results can be recovered when it is re-enabled.

Accessibility

Respondus participates in voluntary accessibility review testing, is WCAG 2.2 compliant, and functions with a range of assistive technologies. Please review the vendor's accessibility guide for complete information about the compatible and recommended assistive tools.

In local testing performed by the Academic Success Centre, RLDB functioned normally using NVDA and Read&Write; however there are 2 know issues when using Kurzweil ReadTheWeb: quiz answers cannot be read back and the mouse hover (reading aloud anywhere the cursor is positioned) does not function. Both these issues have been reported to the vendor.

Additional Training

Instructors who prefer more formal training have several options:

• Schedule a 1-on-1 session with a Respondus trainer (available through the 'Guides & Support' link shown above.)
• Attend one of the vendor's weekly live webinars. 

Respondus will also provide training sessions for specific units or covering specific topics on-demand. Please contact IST support to arrange something for a group of instructors.  

The recommended option is to use New Quizzes. 

The instructions and linked guides below will reflect the new quiz engine and workflows as opposed to the classic quizzes. However, there may be some conditions or use cases where classic quizzes make more sense, so instructors requiring that information should refer to the Canvas Community documentation for more information.

If instructors are planning to use quizzes for BYOD in-class exams, it is essential to review the guidelines for delivering online exams and especially to remind students to use the EduRoam (preferred) or UWS networks and not the Guest@UofA network which is known to drop connections and can cause students to lose answers or submissions.

Classic Quiz vs New Quiz

When creating a quiz on Canvas, you will immediately be prompted whether to choose a classic quiz or a new quiz:

At this time, we recommend using the new quiz engine for most purposes. The classic-style quiz will not continue to receive updates and will likely be discontinued and phased out at some point in the future. In general, new quizzes have better options for adding attempts and adjusting time limits for students, more question types, and a question bank similar to the Moodle question bank with improved options for sharing questions between instructors and courses. 

Any quizzes and questions automatically migrated as a part of the K16 mass migration from eClass during the LMS transition will use the New Quiz format. Any quizzes that are manually migrated will transfer as Classic quizzes.

It is important to note that a classic quiz can be migrated to a new quiz, but not the other way around. Questions from classic quizzes can be converted into new quizzes but questions created for new quizzes are not backwards compatible. The 'migrate' function is the only way to transfer classic quiz questions to new quizzes, so only deployed questions can be moved to item banks. (Canvas has created instructions for migrating Classic quizzes to New quizzes.)

The table below illustrates some key differences, but note that the main features of classic quizzes absent in new quizzes are the option to break up exams into sections separated by text headings and the ability to export student analysis reports showing all responses from students (both of which are slated for release by Canvas in Q4 2024):

Distinguishing New or Classic Quizzes

If you already have a quiz on Canvas, the easiest way to determine whether it is a new quiz or classic quiz is the icon:

Note that when either a classic quiz or new quiz has had any students submit it, the icon fills in green and it can no longer be unpublished):

Instructors can also determine which is which within the quiz settings. If you see a Build button at the bottom, it is a New Quiz:

If you see a tab at the top to access the questions, it is a Classic Quiz:

Adding New Quizzes

The basics for adding new quizzes is well documented in the Canvas knowledge base guide for adding new quizzes.

Some important settings to note are:

Quiz Type (New in December 2025): Select from a standard Graded quiz or the 2 options for ungraded feedback Surveys. This feature is a direct replacement for the feedback activity from eClass. For more information, see How Do I Create a Survey using New Quizzes.

Points: The number of points the quiz will be worth in the gradebook - This can be different from the total of marks in the quiz, that total will be scaled to this value

Assignment Group: If you using assignment groups to weight items in your gradebook, then this will determine which weight group the quiz is associated with:

Display Grade as: This determines how the grade is displayed to students and in the gradebook. Grades can be shown as a percentage or a letter grade (using a grading scheme) or complete/incomplete (100% grades show as complete).

The Assign To section allows quizzes to be released at different times to course sections or individual students: 

If an 'Available Until Time' AND a 'Time Limit' are both set for a quiz, the 'Available Until Time' takes precedence. In other words if a student launches a 30 minute quiz, 15 minutes before the close time, they will only receive 15 minutes to write the quiz. If it is after the quiz launch time, Canvas does not display the quiz close time when students are launching their attempt so this information should be also set in the 'Due Time' field and/or also written into the description field for the quiz.

You can add additional Assign to boxes to create different settings for individuals or sections. This may be useful when deploying quizzes at different times for different sections of a course or when students require accommodations. 

When using the 'Until Time' as opposed to a Time Limit to close off access to quizzes, especially if there are different close times for different students, a different 'Due Time' needs to be set for every 'Until Time' otherwise after the 'Available from Time', students will not be able to see when their particular attempt will close:

Instructors should also review the information in Student Accommodations in Canvas Quizzes for more information on providing different quiz delivery times for specific students using the Moderate tab within quizzes, which includes options to set this a single time for the entire course.

The bottom-right of the page has buttons to save your settings or continue on to the Build page, where you can add questions, adjust quiz-specific settings, like time limits and question behaviours (see below), and access moderation settings for individual students to provide time modifiers or set accommodations (see below):

Note: Once any student has taken a quiz, you cannot unpublish it.

You can also get to the Build page by clicking the vertical ellipsis icon (⋮) next to a quiz and selecting 'Build' from the menu there which can be a convenient shortcut:

For further details, please see Canvas' complete documentation on New Quizzes.

Available New Quiz Question Types

Once the new quiz has been added and built, you must add questions through the Build menu - either pulling them from migrated item banks or manually creating them. The Canvas support portal has in-depth guides on adding the different new quiz question types:

Multiple Choice
Essay
File upload
fill in the blank
True or False
Numeric
Multiple Answer
Ordering
Categorization
Formula
Hot Spot
Matching
Stimulus content (useful for displaying a single image, video, or other media and delivering a series of questions alongside)

Note: If a computer's default language is French or another language that uses a comma as the decimal separator, remind your students to use a comma as your decimal separator for numerical or calculated questions. If you enter a period in a decimal with trailing zeros (i.e., 99.00), Canvas will erase the trailing zeros (i.e., "99" instead of "99.00").

New Quiz Settings

Apart from the 'Assignment-level' settings covered above, New quizzes have a number of alternatives that instructors can select for their assessment, available from within the Build menu (see above), then the Settings tab. If your quiz has any existing student attempts, you will see an alert to be cautious:

The available settings include a number of features relating to the delivery of quizzes to students and the options for quiz security. Highlights about these features are below but Canvas has detailed explanations of all the various options here.

Quiz Delivery Settings:

• It is possible to shuffle the question order, the answer order, and/or to allow students to only view one question at a time. It is not recommended for instructors to prevent backtracking:
  
  
  
  
• When shuffling answer choices, for the multiple choice question type this must ALSO be enabled at the question level and it is also possible to lock specific answers in place (eg. 'None of the above')
  
  

Security Settings:

• Quizzes can be protected with an access code (a password that students must know and enter to launch it), restricted for access from only certain IP addresses or ranges, and can detect when students are accessing from multiple sessions at the same time:
  
  
• When Detect Multiple Sessions is enabled, students will see a warning if they attempt to open a second exam session, even if they are doing so due to a device problem, network issue, etc. This alert is also triggered if they access the quiz launch page and the quiz itself with a different browser session.
  
  
• Instructors who are delivering exams in on-campus computer labs can restrict student access to those labs. The IP address ranges are available from IST Canvas Support or the IST Labs and Classrooms team. It is not recommended to attempt to limit student attempts using wifi network ranges.

Using New Quiz Item Banks

New Quizzes use Item banks rather than question banks to save and share content. For ease of access, ensure that your course has an item bank link in the left-side navigation menu by dragging it to the upper section in your course settings >> Navigation (tab). The item bank is never visible to students.

Item banks can be used to organize questions and to pull questions or random sets of questions into quizzes by clicking the Item Banks button at the top of the 'Build' page in the new quiz (or by clicking the + button and then the folder icon on the question type chooser), selecting the desired bank, then selecting individual questions or + All/Random:

If you wish to give different students different subsets of questions (ie. select 5 questions from each bank for each student), this is configured after the random question is created by clicking the edit icon for the random question set:

The Canvas knowledge portal contains complete documentation on using item banks and randomizing questions in quizzes.

When working with Item Banks migrated from eClass, especially in courses with a large or deep hierarchy of question bank categories, users will sometimes encounter challenges in organizing questions since Canvas Item Banks do not allow nesting. The default sort order, which cannot be altered, is alphabetical, but when adding questions to quizzes from the build screen, it is possible to sort the item banks by latest activity, which can help distinguish between common bank names.

Sharing Item Banks

There is a known issue when copying item banks from a course where a bank is shared with 'Edit' permisions, the sharing will revert to 'View' permissions.

This can be adjusted by clicking the sharing icon for that bank:

Then changing the dropdown beside the new course from Can view to Can edit:

Setting up Canvas Quiz Accommodations

It is possible to provide students accommodations on quizzes either by adding additional time or by entering a time multiplier (but not both at the same time). These can be entered for individual quizzes or for the all the quizzes in the course.

For more information about this, please see our guide for creating Student Accommodations in Canvas Quizzes or consult the Canvas documentation for how to enter accommodations.

Canvas Quiz Known Issues/Important Alerts

Through the Fall 2024, Winter 2025, and Spring/Summer 2025 terms we have identified a number of issues with quizzes that instructors need to be aware of and take steps to mitigate for successful delivery of exams. Where applicable, these issues have been all been reported to the vendor for resolution - in some cases the issue is normal function for Canvas' New quizzes.

As a standard practice, instructors should ensure they review ALL Canvas quiz questions thoroughly before using them in summative exams and are encouraged to also register their exams for a review with eClass support.

1. Quiz results are not hidden by default 

By default, Canvas quizzes are open for students to review as soon as they are completed. Instructors who want to hold quizzes back during flexible block exams and while reviewing questions and grades need to adjust 2 settings.

2. Quizzes are slow to load

Quizzes -- especially larger ones -- can sometimes take 15 - 60 seconds to load (though once launched they typically perform faster.) If instructors are running short duration, timed assessments, they should provide all students with additional time on the assessment and clarify that the extra time is for any quiz loading issues.

3. Stimulus Questions (eClass 'Description' type questions do not show to students

Stimulus questions in Canvas only display if they are linked to other questions. If no question is attached, the stimulus will not appear in the quiz. When quizzes were migrated from eClass, "Description" questions were converted into Stimulus questions but because they are not attached to anything, they will not display to students.

Workaround: Rebuild these items using the Text Block question type in Canvas. Text Blocks are the correct way to add instructions or extra information without needing a question attached.

4. Using 'Vary Points by Answer' with random questions

The option to 'Vary Points by Answer' prevents the option for instructors to customize the point value for 'all or random' question pulls into quizzes from those item banks. These 2 features CANNOT be used together or else students will see different quiz total point values than expected. 
Workaround: Use these questions with their actual scores and scale the overall quiz value on the assignment settings page. Reported to vendor.

5. Manually importing eClass quiz questions does not use the latest question version 

When manually importing quiz questions from eClass using backup and restore, the latest versions of questions are not imported into Canvas meaning that any edits made to questions on eClass/eClass External since a question's creation will be lost. This issue does not occur if questions are migrated as a part of the K16 process.

Workaround: Instructors need to perform a manual export/import of the question's category within eClass before exporting a backup for Canvas which will 'flatten' the questions into a single version (recreating the questions makes new copies of them that have only the single version.) Alternatively if question version edits have been minor, these could be re-written when reviewing question in Canvas.

To 'flatten' a list of question bank questions in Moodle:

1. 1. Organize the questions desired into a single category.
   2. Export that category as a Moodle XML format.
   3. Import the XML file created into another course (sandbox, non-credit creation, a different location)

The questions will then be the single, latest version. To transfer these into Canvas, you would need to create a quiz comprised of these questions; treating a quiz as if it were a question bank category, then export the mbz from Moodle into Canvas.

6. Setting IP Address restrictions prevents instructors from previewing a quiz

The preview page will spin for any quiz that uses IP address restrictions. 
Workaround: Remove the IP address restrictions will constructing and previewing a quiz and only enter them when a quiz is launched. It is also an option to duplicate the quiz, remove the restrictions, and preview that version. Canvas is working on a fix for this issue.

7. New quiz titles do not update

Any edits made to new quiz titles on the Assignment editing page do not reflect in the Build page for the quiz. 
Workaround: Copy any changes over manually.

8. Unable to edit quiz question message

The message below normally appears if students have taken attempts of a question and edits are required. The system will only create new versions of the question for future attempts on it - quiz attempts already completed will retain the old version.

However the message can sometimes appear even if there are no actual student submissions. One common reason is that the quiz was accessed using Student View. The Test Student behaves similarly to a real student submission and can trigger this message, even though it does not appear in the Moderate tab. Note that this issue is different from the problems editing questions stemming from course copies of shared item banks identified above.
Workaround: Make a copy of the question to use in the quiz, or if the quiz was imported from a previous course, re-importing it may resolve the issue. There are no known issues with creating copies of quiz questions.

Un-editable Stimulus items: (Resolved July 2025) Stimulus prompts that have been used in quizzes that have been attempted also can not be edited, but won't show this warning message. The workaround remains the same, first duplicating the Stimulus, then performing edits on the duplicate copy. 

9. Timer issues when re-admitting students to quizzes

Instructors can re-open a quiz attempt from the 'moderate' section of a new quiz, by clicking the pencil icon next to the student's entry. This may be useful, for example, if a student experiences issues with their device and the quiz time runs out before they are able to access the quiz again:

However there are two notable issues when doing this: Most importantly, the student will be given the full time from the quiz settings, with no option to override that. As well, there is a bug that causes the timer to be hidden from the student's display when they re-enter the quiz. Canvas is aware of both of these issues and there is currently no workaround.

It is also possible to add time to in-progress quiz attempts but instructors must ensure that students are able to refresh and/or re-launch their quiz attempt for these changes to be displayed in the quiz.

10. Individual quiz questions cannot bepreview from the item bank when testing

Canvas can only preview the entire quiz. This issue has been reported to Canvas. The best known workaround for this is to place the question to test on the first page as the first question, then preview it.

11. Questions might have their answers shuffled after migration

Multiple choice questions that were migrated from eClass sometimes have their answers shuffled, even if they didn't shuffle on the eClass quiz. This occurs because in an eClass quiz, answer shuffling required that the quiz-level setting "Shuffle within questions" was switched on, as well as having "Shuffle the choices" checked for the specific questions. In Canvas, there is no quiz-level setting and any question that has "Shuffle Choices" checked on will shuffle the answer order. Any question that had "Shuffle the choices" checked in eClass will have "Shuffle Choices" checked in Canvas.
Workaround: Edit the question in the quiz and uncheck "Shuffle Choices". 

12. Problems with Images in Questions

New in December 2025, we have identified a small number of quizzes where images that appear functional in the instructor editing view do not function in the quiz preview or when students are attempting quizzes. This issue has been reported to Instructure but they have not yet been able to determine the cause or repair the problem. So far, the U of A is the only institution where this issue has been reported.

Instructors who encounter this problem can use the following workarounds as a temporary fix until Canvas diagnoses and/or resolves the problem: 

1. 1. If the question only exists in a specific quiz (ie. it is not pulled from an item bank), instructors can replace the image by downloading it, re-uploading it into the course files area, and then re-adding it to the question.
   2. If the questions are housed in an item bank, instructors can replace the image with a link to the file in google drive by downloading the image, uploading it into their drive space, setting the sharing to ‘Anyone with the link’, and entering that link in the image’s place in the question.
   3. Alternatively, instructors can upload files to their google drive and then take the image embed code from their drive (after setting the sharing permissions) and paste that into the html editor in the question. These steps are demonstrated here.
      
      

13. Quiz instructions do not preserve formatting (Resolved)

Paragraphs and other formatting entered into the description of quizzes are dropped when students view quizzes. 
Workaround: None.

Update Jan 30/2025:
Canvas engineering have created a fix that has passed initial QA testing is currently undergoing beta testing in advance of release.

14. Performance Problems when Editing Quizzes (Resolved)

Quizzes with numerous questions or that pull random or all questions from item banks are sometimes slow to load and sometimes display the error message "NetworkError when attempting to access resource" when editing.
Workaround: Refresh page. Update: Canvas engineering has released a fix for this issue.

15. Using Item Bank questions that contain images (Resolved)

Canvas released a fix in November 2024 to address issues relating to image permissions and images in item bank questions created in 1 course and then copied to another course. This fix is still being propagated across all questions and files in Canvas so quizzes may still contain images that still point to previous courses.
Workaround: This problem can be identified (and resolved) by opening any item bank questions that contain images, clicking in the editor panel, clicking an image, viewing the Image options, confirming the url type, and if it is course-based without a verifier link (see video) ,re-uploading the image and then clicking Done at page bottom to trigger a new save on the question:

Note: There are sometimes short delays before the new url will display in questions but once they appear, all images with new urls should function in quizzes regardless of their original course of origin or the published status on the file.

Update Jan 30/2025:
Canvas engineering has offered to run the image fix on any specific quizzes and questions where instructors have identified broken images. Please contact eClass support for more information about that.

As a starting point, instructors can watch this screen recording of CTL's Introductory Wooclap webinar delivered June 11. 2025.

Adding Wooclap to a course

Wooclap needs to be linked to a Canvas course using an assignment:

1. First, click on the +Assignment button on the top right.
    Then set the Submission type to external tool:

Note: For Submission Type to be available, 'Display Grade as' must be set to one of Percentage, Complete/Incomplete, or Points.)

2. Click Find:

3. Click Wooclap to open the resource link:

4. On the resource link modal screen, select one of the following:
    - Create from scratch (Select this if you intend to create from scratch OR re-use your existing polls in Wooclap)
    - Duplicate an existing event (this creates a duplicate copy of the event in Wooclap) 
    - Choose a template is currently not available.

    Then click Continue:

4.a. If you selected Duplicate an existing event, you will see a dialogue box that allows you to search through all your existing Wooclap events and select one to copy all of the existing questions from. This will leave your existing event unchanged:

Once an event is selected, scroll to the bottom and click Confirm choice.

5. Once users choose either a blank even or a duplicated event, the 'Configure External Tool' modal will display the tool link where they can resize the window or scroll down to see more options. Open in a new tab is checked by default and is recommended:

Click Select to confirm, then click Save or Save and publish at the bottom of the Canvas assignment page. 

Note: If you had entered an assignment name prior to this step, it will be replaced by "New Wooclap Event" and you have to re-enter a name at this step.

6. Here is a quick video to summarize:

Creating Events and Questions in Wooclap

Once added to the Canvas course, clicking the tool link will show a button to launch the tool.

Once the tool loads, you will land on the new Wooclap event -- either blank or containing existing questions -- where you can add or edit questions and configure your event:

Once you are working directly in Wooclap and you have accessed an Event, clicking New question allows you to select from a wide variety of question types - hovering over each question type will provide additional details and usage guidelines:

Integrating Wooclap with Presentation Tools

You can integrate Wooclap questions and events directly into your existing presentation workflow using the methods below.

Google Slides:

There are two primary ways to use Wooclap with Google Slides. For a detailed walkthrough, refer to the guide on How to use Wooclap in Google Slides.

• Option 1: The Wooclap Extension/Add-on – Install the browser extension to insert interactions directly into your slides.

• Option 2: Import to Wooclap – Upload your Google Slides file directly into the Wooclap interface. This method also supports .ppt and .pptx files.

Note: Unlike PowerPoint or PDF imports, Google Slides integration does not allow questions to be "nested" between slides. Instead, you can seamlessly toggle between your presentation slides and live real-time votes.

PowerPoint:

Wooclap offers multiple integration paths for PowerPoint as well.

• Importing Presentations – You can combine Wooclap with PowerPoint, Keynote, or PDF files by importing them into a Wooclap event. This allows you to insert questions between your slides for a unified experience.

• Wooclap PowerPoint Add-In – While an add-in (click here for the guide) exists for embedding events directly into PowerPoint. (Video walkthrough available)
  ! Current status:

  • Unknown capability on podium computers - testing has been planned.

  • On U of A managed devices on STS domain, users will require an additional sign-in step using SSO.
    

Delivering Events

Wooclap events and questions are displayed to students by clicking the Start Event button or Display button at the top of the event or by clicking Display to the right of specific questions:

If using the Start Event or entire event Display button, instructors will see (and can display for students, the event launch page:

Once students access sessions through Canvas (or any of the other methods), they will see an alert that No Question is Live until instructors advance from the launch screen or click the Display on a particular question (see above.)

Self-Paced Sessions

Instructors can use self-paced sessions [previously known as Participant's Pace] to have participants answer questions asynchronously.

• You can Add a presentation to self-paced quizzes.
• Please refer to Self-Paced Session article from Wooclap to explore more options and use cases for Self-Paced Sessions. 
  
  

Grading and Synchronizing with Canvas

To sync your grades to Canvas, you have to make sure to activate the right authentication method in the main settings (LMS login), before you start the event. If you have created your session outside the LMS (see below), participants can still be identified using different authentication methods but grades can only be uploaded via CSV file. Only events that are created through Canvas have the LMS Login option:

Once an event created through Canvas is completed, you can click on the "Synchronize with LMS" button to push the grades to the gradebook. You can then choose which items you want to sync (there are three options available: Results, Attendance, Participation). This action will push the grades to the Gradebook. Note that you can only synchronize one of the three. 

Please note that the Attendance option will only show up if you have the "Attendance sheet" turned on in settings.

• Participation is scored based on the number of questions the participant answered compared to the total number of questions requiring an answer. This score is then converted into a percentage in the LMS environment.
• Results represent the points earned based on the correctness of the answers. Questions without a correct answer (such as open questions or word clouds) are not considered when calculating the results.
• Attendance is only available if the attendance sheet is activated. Participants receive points for attendance once they have signed the attendance sheet: 100% for signing in and 0% for not signing in.
  
  

This article lists the steps instructors need to follow to export their gradebook from Canvas, reformat it correctly, and then import it into Bear Tracks. To use this process, users must be enrolled in BearTracks/Campus Solutions as the instructor of record for a credit course and enrolled in Canvas as a Teacher in the same course.

New in April 2025, instructors can now use a custom tool in their Canvas course to prepare a csv spreadsheet for import into Bear Tracks (instead of manually exporting grades and merging that file with a csv export from Bear Tracks as shown in items 1 - 4.) Instructions for using this tool are available in bullet 5 below.

Update June 2025: the Bear Tracks grade export tool has gone through a first round of improvements from issues identified in beta testing, including a shift in how the tool is accessed in the course settings. This tool is now the recommended process for transferring Canvas grades into Bear Tracks but the instructions (in items 3 - 4) for exporting csv files from both systems and merging them have been left in place below in case instructors need to maintain spreadsheets outside the LMS to perform complex grade calculations.

Getting Started

Before Canvas can export course totals as letter grades, the gradebook needs to be set up to use letter grades. This is configured in the main course settings (not in the gradebook) by enabling a Grading Scheme:

Instructors must ensure that the letter grade scheme meets their college, faculty, program, department, and/or personal needs (with additional guidance available in Using the Canvas Gradebook.)

Please note that there is no requirement that instructors use the Canvas gradebook to record and compute grades or to transfer them from there into Bear Tracks. In cases where there are smaller numbers of students it might make more sense to use Canvas to record and compute scores but then just enter them into Bear Tracks manually. Alternatively if very complex grade calculations are required, the Canvas gradebook may not be able meet instructor's needs so it may make more sense to export scores directly into a spreadsheet, make calculations there, and then reformat for Bear Tracks import. 

Using the Bear Tracks Grade Export (BETA) tool

The Bear Tracks Grade Export tool creates a pre-formatted csv spreadsheet containing all required grades and student information for upload into Bear Tracks for a course. In combined courses, the correct primary component section is added for every section.  Note that instructors MUST validate their letter grading scheme and proof check the grades in the produced spreadsheet before uploading into Bear Tracks.

To use the tool to create your Bear Tracks grades csv, navigate to the course settings, then to the course sub-settings menu at the top right, and click on Bear Tracks Grade Export (BETA): 

Clicking it will show the export screen in the center panel with detailed usage instructions about the tool and a dropdown box to select the appropriate Canvas course total column for use:

Most often the correct selection will be to choose the Final Grade column but when instructors use a Manual Posting Policy and have not released all scored grades to student BEFORE they are uploading into Bear Tracks (for example if they only want to display the final letter score in Bear Tracks), they will need to select the appropriate alternative column:

• Final Grade - Letter grades are calculated from the average percent score counting all ungraded, missing, and unposted grades as 0.
• Current Grade - Letter grades are calculated from the average percent score from all graded assignments  with missing, ungraded, and unposted grades omitted entirely (excluded from calculations).
• Unposted Current Grade - Grades are like Current Grade but include any scores in graded but unposted assignments.
• Unposted Final Grade - Grades are like Final Grade but includes any scores in graded but unposted assignments.

Once instructors have selected the column they require, they can click Fetch Grades (see screenshot above).

When the fetch completes, the csv will be automatically downloaded to your machine and it can then be uploaded into Bear Tracks (see below.)

Downloading Student Grade Files

Note: This and the following section are only required if instructors are manually merging student Canvas grades with a Bear Tracks export file instead of using the Bear Tracks Grade Export tool.

Once grades have been assigned for items and tabulated into a final grade in the Canvas gradebook at the end of term, instructors will need to download and combine two files: an export of the Canvas gradebook and a grade roster export from Bear Tracks.

Download the Canvas Gradebook:

1. Enter the gradebook by clicking Grades in the course left nav menu. When working in a combined course, instructors must upload different section's grades into Bear Tracks individually. If this is your case, then filter the gradebook to the specific section you are trying to upload near the top left:

2. Then click Export near the top right and choose Export Current Gradebook View:

Download the Bear Tracks Grade Roster:

1. Login into Bear Tracks and access the Instructor Centre.

2. Access the class and section that you need to upload grades for, then click the Grade Roster icon to the left of its name:

3. Scroll down and click the Download button to the right of the Quick Reference Guides:

You should now have 2 .csv files: the Canvas one with a name like '[date-stamp]_Grades-[course-name].csv' and the Bear Tracks one with a name like '[term number.course code].csv'.

Combining the Files

For this process, elements from both files will be need to be put into one combined spreadsheet that is compatible for Bear Tracks import. The required columns from the Bear Tracks spreadsheet are the Term and the Class Number; and the required columns from the Canvas spreadsheet are the SIS User ID (which is the Bear Tracks Student ID #) and the Current Grade (read only) or Final Grade (read only). Both of these spreadsheets have 2 header rows above the rows of class and student data and these do not need to be edited at all.

This guide will demonstrate how to merge these columns using Google sheets but any spreadsheet tool (Excel, LibreOffice, Numbers, etc) should work. Google sheets is being demonstrated because it is freely available to all U of A faculty and staff and other spreadsheet programs sometimes convert .csv files in unexpected ways (see Additional notes below.)

Merge the files:

1. Drag and drop (or browse and select) both files into a browser tab opened to your google My Drive:

2. Double-click to open the Canvas .csv file preview, then select Open with > Google sheets:

3. Select and delete the grade row for the test student from the very bottom of the sheet. (This row may not be in your gradebook if you have not submitted anything using the test student or reset it recently):

4. Delete all the columns except SIS User ID and Current Grade (read only), then click ctrl/cmd a to select all the data and ctrl/cmd c to copy it:

5. Go back to your Google drive and double-click the Bear Tracks csv to open the preview and then select Open with > Google sheets for that file. (Repeat Step 2 above for the Bear Tracks csv file.)

6. Delete all the columns except Term and Class Number:

7. Place your cursor in the top row of Column C then paste the data copied from the Canvas csv spreadsheet. The resulting file should look like this with the number of students matching the rows in the Bear Tracks spreadsheet:

8. Rename the file to something identifiable and then select Download > Comma Separated Values (.csv) to export the file:

Uploading into Bear Tracks

Take note of where this file was saved because it now needs to be uploaded into Bear Tracks (for either the Bear Tracks Grade Export tool method or if manually combining spreadsheets):

1. Login into Bear Tracks and access the Instructor Centre. Access the class and section that you need to upload grades for, then click the Grade Roster icon to the left of its name (see screenshot above.)

2. Scroll down and click the Upload button to right of the Quick Reference Guides. Then click Choose File, select the file you have just created and downloaded from Google Drive, then click Upload:

Note: Below the upload area is an additional box to enter comments and/or additional grade-related files. Instructors should consult their departments for any specific requirements they need to follow for those fields.

3. If there are any issues with student matching, they will be listed below the comments area. Uploaded grades will appear in the Roster Grade column of the Student Grade table:

Additional Notes

• Take care when using Excel that the leading zeros are not automatically truncated from any Student ID #s (the SIS ID column from the Canvas gradebook export.) To get around this issue, the SIS User ID column can be formatted to text.
• Bear Tracks Instructor Resources (Guides)
• Bear Tracks Google Docs Guide

For a comprehensive overview of all the Canvas gradebook features, please see How Do I Use the Gradebook in the Canvas KB.

Adding Grade Columns

• Note that an assignment must be published to the course to be used in grade calculations, so if you'd like to create a manual grade column that doesn't show in other areas of the course, the Assignments section in the course navigation settings should be hidden, and any links to student-facing assignment activities must be added to Modules. It is standard practice to hide the Assignments and Quizzes course navigation items and add the assignments you'd like to remain visible to the Modules section. 
  
  
• Deleting a Grade Column from the Gradebook
  
  To delete a grade column in Canvas, go to the Assignments page, find the specific assignment, quiz, or discussion that created the column, and then delete that graded item from the Assignments section. The corresponding column will then be removed from your gradebook.

Grade Visibility Settings

A commonly used feature in the eClass gradebook is hiding grades from student view until an instructor chooses to release them. By default, grade columns in the Canvas gradebook can't be hidden until at least one grade has been entered, which will also trigger an email notification to that student that they've been graded on the assignment.

To change this behaviour for a course, click the cog at the top right of the gradebook, then under the Gradebook Settings, select Grade Posting Policy and change the setting in the right-side menu to Manually Post Grades:

Posting Grades

When you select posting grades manually, grades for all assignments will then remain hidden until you select Post grades from the ellipsis menu (⋮) next to the grade item name in the gradebook column header. You can also change the grade posting policy for a specific column in the gradebook under the ellipsis.

Hiding Grades After Posting

In addition to posting grades, you have the option to Hide grades:

Be aware that this choice does not override the grade posting policy. Choosing to hide grades will hide grades already posted.

If you have set your policy to Automatically Post Grades, students will still see and be notified of any grades subsequently entered.

To hide grades subsequently entered, change the grade posting policy for the column to Manually Post Grades.

Hiding Grades Totals and Grade Distributions

Canvas also allows instructors to just hide the totals in their gradebook, both the overall final total and any assignment group totals. This is done in the course settings: 

If the setting "Hide grade distribution graphs from students" is not enabled, students can click on an assignment or quiz in their grade books and see a graph of the distribution of grades for the assignment or quiz:

Note: In a small class of 25 or fewer students, allowing students to see the grade distribution graph may raise privacy concerns, as they could deduce their fellow students' grades.

With the setting enabled to hide grade distribution graphs, instructors can still see the assignment grade distribution by clicking on Course Analytics:

In Course Analytics, click on the Course Grade tab and change the Chart Options drop-down to Data Table. Click any link to reveal the assignment average, low, and high grades:

Hidden Grades Indicator

There is a new option in the gradebook that will show instructors an icon for any grades that have not yet been posted to students.

This feature helps instructors quickly identify which grades are hidden from students, reducing confusion and ensuring more accurate communication about grade visibility. At times, instructors may switch their grade posting policy to Manually Post Grades, while some grades have already been posted. The indicator provides a simple way to distinguish which grades are already visible to students and which are still hidden.

To change this setting for a course, click the cog at the top right of the gradebook, then under the Gradebook Settings, select View Options and then select View hidden grades indicator:

GradeBook Filter

The main gradebook view has a filter tool at the top right that can be very useful in large courses to limit the display as needed. The gradebook can be filtered on a number of different criteria:

Full documentation from Canvas describes how to use these filters and the available options in detail.

Viewing Student Grades

Instructors can view what the grades view their students see through the gradebook by clicking their name and then clicking Grades from the modal overlay that launches from the right edge of the page:

The students' grade view looks like this:

Basic Course Total Calculations

The standard Canvas gradebook mechanism for calculating course totals is equivalent to using the "simple weighted mean" aggregation method from eClass. The course total is the sum of raw point scores across all scored assignments in the course, expressed as a percentage of the overall points. This means that an item's weight will be its proportion of the course's total grade. So, for example, if there are 3 items in the gradebook:

       Item 1 = 20 points
       Item 2 = 30 points
       Item 3 = 75 points
       (Total = 125 points)

A student's course score would be calculated as ([Item 1 score] + [Item 2 score] + [Item 3 score])/125 and displayed as a percentage in the course total column. The weight of Item 1 would be 20/125.

Weighted Grade Calculations

Items can be weighted within a course using assignment groups. By default, a course has a single assignment group called "Assignments," but new ones can be created, and any gradeable item (a quiz or assignment) can be added to a group from the assignments page. Assignment groups are functionally similar to gradebook categories in Moodle.

From the assignments page in your course, you just need to click the ellipsis icon (⋮) and select "Assignment group weights" to enable and define the weights:

For those needing more advanced calculations, the only option is to perform them outside the Canvas gradebook and either manually enter students' total scores or import scores for an entire assignment or term from a spreadsheet.

To enter the course total score manually or from a spreadsheet instead of having it automatically calculate, enter the gradebook settings via the cog wheel icon in the top right of the gradebook, then select the 'Advanced' tab, and select Allow final grade override. This will add an 'Override' column to the right of the total column where you can enter a new grade.

The one area where the gradebook does allow advanced calculations is within specific assignment groups where it is possible to ignore a certain number of a student's low or high scores (with the option to make some assignments 'required', i.e., excluded from the dropping). These settings are made by clicking the 3 dots icon near the top right of an assignment group:

Updating Grades in the Gradebook

Grades may be updated in Grades automatically or manually.

Quiz: Once all questions are graded in a quiz, Grades will update automatically. If multiple attempts are allowed, the grade will be applied corresponding to the quiz setting Highest, Average, Latest, or First.

Assignment: If multiple attempts are allowed in an assignment, you can view all attempts in the SpeedGrader "Submission ot view" dropdown menu:

Select the submission you want to grade. Submissions are listed in chronological order. If you have chosen an earlier submission, the message will appear: Note: This is not the most recent submission.

Manual entry: To override a grade or enter one manually, simply click in the Grades cell corresponding to the student and the graded item and type the new grade.

Assigning and Displaying Letter Grades

If you would like to show letter grades with the course totals, you will need to enable a course grading scheme, found in your course settings, on the "Course Details" tab. Once enabled, you can use an existing grading scheme from the drop-down menu or define a new grading scheme by clicking "+ New Grading Scheme". This process is similar to editing your grade letters in eClass and is necessary to export a .csv file with a column of letter grades to upload to Beartracks.

When selecting from the existing grading schemes, the recommended option is the 'Default U of A Grading Scheme':

Note that this scheme/scale is the "best fit" based on the official U of A grading guidelines, so individual instructors, departments, or programs should ensure they review the boundaries prior to using it. The letter grade range boundaries are:

Once these letter grades are used in a course, instructors have the option of exporting the grades for import in to Bear Tracks.

Showing Only Letter Grades

New in August 2025, instructors can configure their courses to display only letter grades and feedback comments (i.e., no numeric scores will be shown) by toggling the 'Restrict view of quantitative data' checkbox in the course settings:

Note: this setting will only function if a letter grade scheme is added to the course (as per the section above).

Grade Imports

The Import button on the gradebook page lets you import grades from a .csv file, similar to eClass.

The .csv file must include the following columns at the beginning:

• Student
• ID
• SIS User ID (U of A student ID number)
• Section

The other columns can be left blank.

(It is recommended that you first export the gradebook as a .CSV to use as a template. Be sure to leave the top three rows intact and remove any existing columns that already have grade data.

Additionally, if you have already set up the Gradebook or used assignment groupings, it is important to find the column(s) that contain the Canvas assignment ID in parentheses; otherwise, the import will fail.

Example:

You will be prompted with what to do with a newly importing grade item:

• map to an existing, or
• create a new

For more information about importing grades: How do I import grades in the Gradebook?

Grade Exports

Instructors can export the gradebook from Canvas as a CSV file using the button at the top right, selecting either the entire gradebook or the current view (which can be useful when using filters to limit to specific sections, groups, or students). 

The export contains several columns that are fully explained in Canvas' documentation.

** Please note that instructors can now use a custom tool in their Canvas course to prepare a CSV spreadsheet specifically for importing grades into Bear Tracks. **

Like YuJa, Canvas Studio stores multimedia content, which can be used to link content to courses, share, and organize by course channel. Features include:

• Video cloud storage,
• Video recording with picture-in-picture capture,
• Sharing videos between courses,
• Gradable quiz tools,
• Captioning,
• Adding text annotations to videos,
• And allowing student comments on videos.

Canvas also provides excellent training resources including a video course with readings and short knowledge checks at Canvas Studio Training and a separate Canvas Studio Guide in the knowledge base.

Note: 10 GB is the maximum size for a single media file in Canvas Studio.

Accessing Canvas Studio

To get started, open Studio by clicking on the Studio link at the left of your course page:

Canvas will open Studio to My Library, where you will find your uploaded and recorded content:

Media content can be sorted by date or by name. The content view can be switched to all media, your Collections, and whether the media is captioned:

You can also switch between your media collections using the Course Collections tab in the top menu:

Studio Settings and Menus

 The main Studio Settings menu allows you to create Groups to make sharing among multiple individuals easier. There are no external applications available currently under Studio Integrations.

 Once videos have been uploaded or recorded, clicking the three dots beside any video title will open an options menu:

From here, you can

• Create Quiz: open the quiz creation interface (see Creating video quizzes in Canvas Studio),
• Annotate Video: add annotations to a video (see Creating video quizzes in Canvas Studio),
• Edit Media: open a simple video editor,
• Share Media: share media with another course or instructor,
• Move to: Move media into a course collection,
• Replace Thumbnail: change the thumbnail image for a video,
• Delete Media: delete this instance of media content.

Adding content to Studio

The menu at the top right of the Studio page allows you to create new Collections and also to +Create or add new media in Studio:

Any media added through these tools -- including external videos -- can be annotated, edited, shared, and used in a video quiz.  The options for creating new media include:

• Studio Capture: a microphone, web camera, and screen capture utility recommended for Chrome and Edge browsers,
• Screencast-o-Matic: required to record screen captures using Safari or Firefox browsers,
• Add Media: upload your pre-existing media files or link YouTube or Vimeo videos

Note: Screencast-o-Matic is required to record screen captures using Safari or Firefox browsers. It can also be used with Chrome or Edge browsers, but the Canvas Studio Capture option is recommended for those users. Some versions of iPads do not allow media recording, only the option to upload media.

Note: in Firefox and Safari Screencast-o-Matic is named Screen Capture and Studio Capture is named Webcam Capture:

Add Media opens a simple dialogue box that allows you to add media stored on your computer or to copy the basic hyperlinks links from YouTube or Vimeo.

Note: YouTube and Vimeo videos can also be used in quizzes, annotated, shared, and moved to other courses, but Vimeo videos with an Unlisted privacy setting cannot be added to Studio.

Studio Capture aka Webcam Capture opens to a simple user interface that allows you to specify which devices to use, whether to capture your screen, and to start recording:

Screencast-o-Matic aka Screen Capture has additional tools such as selecting the devices to be recorded, drawing, zoom and help tools, video dimensions selection, and optionally recording computer sounds.

Note: Video recording can be paused to use drawing tools and then restarted

Adding media to a course

Rich Content Editor

Once videos have been added to Studio, they must be linked or embedded in your course so that students can view them. There are currently two ways to add media to a course: by adding the media to a Rich Content Editor in an Assignment, Discussion, or Announcement, or by creating a link in a Module.

To add media to a Rich Content Editor area:

1. Create an Assignment, Discussion, Announcement, or other item with a Rich Content Editor,
2. Click the plugin icon and select Canvas Studio (select View All if Studio is not visible),

3. Search for, or click to select, the video from My Library,
4. Click on Standard embed
5. Click Embed

In Module

To add media to a course Module,

1. Click on the plus-sign to the right of the module:

2. Select External tool from the drop-down menu and click on Canvas Studio:

3. When your Canvas Studio My Library opens, select and embed media as above.

Move media to a course collection

You can organize videos into separate collections to make them easier to find when adding them to a course.

Note: Course collections are not required. They are a useful tool for instructors to help keep videos organized, but media collections cannot be shared easily with a course.

Create a new Collection by clicking the +Collection button in My Library.

Add a video to a collection by clicking the three-dot icon beside the video and select Move to.

You can choose to make a new collection or add to an existing collection:

Sharing media with others

You can share your Studio Media with other people at the U of A or any Studio groups you are a part of. Before you can share with specific users, they must have already accessed Canvas Studio directly to create their account. It is also possible to share public links to your videos.

To share media, click on the three-dot menu and select Share Media:

You can set permissions for using the video and create links that can be shared with anyone who has the link. Note: it is not possible to create a public link that is available only to authenticated U of A users. Public links do not allow users to enter comments nor are any analytics tracked for media usage.

Shared media will be visible under each user's Shared with Me tab:

Canvas Studio Media Sharing Rules: 

• Students can share media with Canvas Studio groups they are members of, all instructors, TAs, instructional designers, and admins at their institution. They can also share media with any verified Canvas Studio user enrolled in their same course(s).
• Instructors, TAs, and instructional designers can share media with Canvas Studio groups they are members of, all other instructors, TAs, instructional designers, and admins at their institution. They can also share media with verified Canvas Studio users enrolled in their courses.
• Admins can share Canvas Studio media with Canvas Studio groups they are members of and all users at the institution.

Student interactions with videos

By default, students can add comments after opening an embedded video in an assignment or discussion. If students pause the playback, they can enter a comment to be shared with the class under the Comments tab:

The comment will be saved after clicking the Comment at <timestamp> button and will act like a running discussion on the video. Instructors can add comments but note that these will not copy forward if videos are moved to other courses. Instructor comments must also be added to videos after they have been published to course channels or they will not display  If instructors need to add more permanent inline notes onto videos, annotations are also available.   Both instructors and students can tag, edit, and delete comments their own comments as well as adding replies to their own and other's comments.

Students and instructors can disable seeing comments by clicking the Settings gear icon and toggling off Comments:

Commenting can be disabled entirely on a video only if the Display media tabs is toggled off when the video is added to an assignment or discussion. If you wish to turn off comments after a video has been added to an assignment or discussion, you must remove it and then add it back with Display media tabs off:

Please note: comments are not attached to the video itself so will not be brought forward if the video is added to another course. If instructors need to add permanent, additional text or links onto videos that will transfer across courses, annotations should be used.

Video captions

Canvas Studio videos are automatically captioned after they are uploaded. New in November 2024, captions are now also automatically published for users to enable and use when viewing videos (formerly instructors had to review and publish captions before viewers could use them.)

Once a video is uploaded or recorded, after the automatic captioning process completes, users will receive an email letting them know that their 'Automatic captions are ready to be reviewed!' and the captions will be automatically published at that time.

Users who want to hold the release of captions until they have reviewed them and made any required edits can adjust their personal captioning settings to disable auto-publishing (see below.)

Reviewing Captions:

To review the captions, users can either 

1. Follow the link in the email or click to View a video in their Library
2. Click on the Captions tab
2. Click the three dots dropdown menu
3. Select Review and Publish

On the Review page, individual captions can be edited by clicking on the caption text and then clicking Save when done editing.

If captions require corrections or refinement later, the owner of a video may choose Edit from the three dots menu under the Captions tab to reopen the caption editing interface:

Once published, a captions button will now be visible in the video controls. Viewers can choose to toggle captions on or off:

Viewers can also change captions options by clicking the Settings gear icon:

Caption Settings:

Users can adjust their preferences for the timing and release of captions for end users:

Studio Analytics

Studio provides robust viewing analytics including overall views, viewed duration, specific viewing stats for students, and student scores on in video quizzes. These statistic are available under the Insights tab on a video in the media library. Complete details on using Studio analytics are available in the Canvas Support portal: please see How do I view Canvas Studio analytics for individual viewers?

Partial Credit Setup

The option to enable partial credit is available only for Matching and Multiple Answer questions. When building these question types, instructors must either award marks based on the number of correct answers and deduct marks for the number of incorrect answers (right minus wrong) or award no marks unless an exact match is given.

In this sample Multiple Answer question, three choices are correct and three choices are incorrect:

The grading options for the question may be either 'Partial credit with penalty' or 'Exact match,'

New Quiz results

For the example MC question above with six choices and three correct and three incorrect answers, this would produce the following results:

Partial credit, one mistake = 1/3 awarded
Partial credit, two mistakes = 0/3 awarded
Exact match, one mistake = 0/6

For a similar Matching question, we would get the following results:

Partial credit, all correct answers are awarded a mark; incorrect answers are not penalized.
Exact match, one mistake = 0/6 awarded

Instructors should test all their grading scenarios using the "Preview" feature in Canvas New Quizzes:

Click to open the quiz. Go to Build. When you Submit, the quiz will be graded but not recorded in your grade book.

Partial Grading in Classic Quizzes

A Canvas Classic Quiz has no differential grading options. This quiz type allows only partial credit grading.

As an example, we created one Matching and one Multiple Answer question in a sample exam with six choices each and three correct and three incorrect answers.

For the Matching question, we got the following results:

First test, one mistake = 5/6
Second test, two mistakes = 4/6

For the Multiple Answer question, we got the following results:

First test, one mistake = 1/3
Second test, two mistakes = 0/3

Instructors should test all their grading scenarios using the "View As Student" feature in Canvas.

In Canvas, there is not a tight H5P integration into the LMS like there was in eClass so it is not possible to construct or use native h5p content directly in the system. Instructors can pay to have their H5P content hosted at an external site like h5p.com or follow the steps outlined below to export their content, convert it to SCORM using a 3rd party tool, Lumi, and then import it into their Canvas course as SCORM.

Downloading H5P Files from eClass or Canvas

The first step in this process is to obtain the native .h5p file(s). This can be done in 2 ways: 1) by accessing an eClass course, accessing the course content bank or H5P activity, and exporting the file; or 2) if an eClass course has already been migrated to Canvas either through the U of A Mass Migration or through manual backup and restore, by downloading the file from the Canvas files area. (The H5P files will not function in Canvas unless they are downloaded, converted into SCORM, then uploaded back into Canvas.)

To download from eClass:

1) Access the course, open the Content bank under More in the top course header, then click on the desired H5P activity:

2) Then open the More dropdown and select Download:

To download from Canvas:

1) Access a course and then open the Files area:

2) Locate the desired .h5p file and then click the 3 dots menu at the far right and select Download. If your course contains a huge number of files (as most of the migrated courses do), it may be helpful to search for ".h5p" files at the top of the page:

Using Lumi to Convert H5P to SCORM

With the native .h5p (or an .h5p zip file) produced by the preceding step, users can now use Lumi to convert the content into SCORM.

1) Navigate to https://lumi.education/en/ and download the Lumi Desktop Editor:

2) You will need to select the correct version for your operating system and then install this on your machine:

3) Then open the Lumi application and select the H5P Editor:

4) Then click Open Existing, browse to the h5p file, and select it to open it:

5) At this stage, the h5p content should display in the application window. Select the File menu near the top left and select Export:

6) In the options modal that appears, select SCORM then Export now. This should create a .zip file on your machine in the downloads folder:

Uploading SCORM files into Canvas

Once you have created the .zip file, you can follow the instructions in Using SCORM in Canvas to add this content to your course. Note that unlike in eClass, SCORM can only be added as entire pages or assignments in modules, not embedded through the RCE editor into other content.

Customizing Notification Settings

Users can specify how or whether to receive messages from Canvas under Notifications:

Notifications for a wide of range of Canvas actions can be set to either Notify Immediately, Daily Summary, Weekly Summary, or Notifications Off by clicking the icon in the column below your email address:

The dropdown above the table allows users to set notifications for their entire account:

or for specific courses:

Important note: Students should NEVER disable the notification option for Announcements for their account or courses because this is the main method that instructors use to communicate important course information.

Customizing Your Profile

Under the Profile link, users can access their profile and view optional fields they can set for their account: Name Pronunciation, additional Contact methods,  Biography, or external Links

These fields can be edited by clicking Edit profile at the top right. You are also able to add a profile picture by hovering over the grey avatar near the top left of the page and clicking the edit icon:

Changing Account Settings

Under the Settings item, users can view the important details of their account. Most of the fields are pulled directly from Bear Tracks and are not editable in the system. If users need to make changes to any of these fields, for example a name change, that should be done in Bear Tracks and the change will automatically be reflected in Canvas.

Note that the name displayed in Canvas maps to the preferred name/last name fields set in a user's Bear Tracks account; if no preferred name is set, the first name is used. Users making affirmed name changes must also set their preferred name to match for that to display in Canvas.

Some settings can be changed (by clicking Edit Settings) from the center right of the page:

• Pronouns: users can select their personal pronouns.
• Language: users can choose to convert the interface language.
• Time Zone: users living in different locations can convert due dates to their local time.

Choosing Feature Options

At the bottom of the Settings page, users can enable a number of features specific to their account by toggling the sliders:

Some features of note are:

• Automatically show closed captions - toggles text captions when viewing media.
• Disable Celebration Animations - turns off the automatic confetti displays that occur for when assignments are submitted on time and for instructors who trigger a clean link validation run.
• High Contrast UI - enables an alternate Canvas visual interface that increase the color contrast of text, buttons, and other elements so they are more distinct and easier to identify.
• Microsoft Immersive Reader - enables a customizeable text-to-speech reading tool by default for pages, assignments, and course home pages. (This feature is also enabled site wide.)

SEM uses the student's webcam and microphone to confirm their identity and then record them during a remote exam attempt. Their onscreen activity is also recorded and the system intelligently monitors for suspicious activities. This tool is authorized under the UofA's Security and Privacy policies.

Important note for April 2026: SEM version 1 will be decommissioned by the vendor after Winter 2026 term. The screenshots in this guide have all been updated to show the SEM V2 interface. Instructors can also view the vendor-supplied documentation for SEM version 2.

System requirements for using SEM:

• Google Chrome browser (both for instructors AND students)
• Desktop or laptop computer (i.e., Windows, MacOS)
• Chromebooks are supported, but iPads and tablets are not, i.e., no Apple iOS or Android devices, etc.
• Please note: because SEM requires as working webcam to function, it does NOT function in on-campus computer labs. Instructors should use Respondus LockDown browser and physical proctoring in those environments.

Determining whether to use SEM:

Guidelines for delivering remote exams

SEM known Issues, system limitations, and recommendations

SEM V1 or SEM V2: SEM 2 is the recommended option since it is improves the student monitoring setup process. Version 1 will be decommissioned by the vendor after Winter 2026 term.

Enabling SEM to deliver a quiz:

The starting point for using SEM is to already have created the quiz. Users will then need to enter the quiz url into the SEM session configuration so that students can only link to it once their monitoring is enabled.

1. Ensure that the quiz link itself is not displayed in a course module and that the course-level Quizzes area is hidden. The course's quiz area visibility can be adjusted in the course settings under Navigation:

2. Once a quiz is already made, set an Access Code (password) for it. Students can sometimes find the link to a quiz with other Canvas tools (eg. calendar, gradebook, to do list, etc.) but setting a password that is only given to students through the SEM interface prevents students from circumventing monitoring.

3. Note the quiz URL:

• For Classic Quiz, you can copy the URL from the browser address bar. e.g. https://canvas.ualberta.ca/courses/292/quizzes/5645
• For New Quizzes, you can copy the URL, but will need to remove the suffix shown after the activity number. e.g. https://canvas.ualberta.ca/courses/347/assignments/726703/edit?quiz_lti 
• https://sites.ualberta.ca/~eclass/kb-images/canvas/canvas-sem-new-quiz-url.png

4. To set up the SEM session, add an item to a module, filter by External Tool, and add Smart Exam Monitor V2.

You will know that you have successfully selected a tool when the URL field is populated. (If it is blank, click on the tool name again to make a URL appear.) Ensure that Load in a new tab is checked. Proctoring results will not load if the external tool is not loaded in a new tab.

6. Once added to a module, click the name you selected and then the button to load it in a new window:

Configuring a SEM session:

Now that you have added the SEM activity to a module, you can add sessions to it. 

1. Click 'Create Session'.

2. Enter the session information. In the first section complete the following fields:

• Title (required): Shown to students in the list of sessions once it is toggled 'Open to students'.
• Description: Visible to students below the session title once it is toggled 'Open to students'. This field can be useful to help students distinguish between different sessions for the same assessment.
• Date/Time: The date and time at which the session will display students the quiz link and password once they have configured their monitoring. 
  • SEM sessions can be open for setup at any time, but the quiz launch will be restricted by the time set here.
  • The start date and time in the SEM settings must be a date on or after the quiz's open date and time (if applicable) to prevent early launches onto a closed quiz which may cause confusion.
• Duration (hours): This value is how long the monitoring session should be set to run by default, up to a maximum of 6 hours. Sessions can be closed at any time by students and can also be extended indefinitely by students. This duration is mostly in place to ensure that the monitoring turns off in case a student forgets to close their SEM app/tab after completing their exam and should not be confused with the quiz timer/duration which is set on the quiz itself in Canvas.
• Exam URL: this is the link to the exam (as shown above.)

In the 'Instructions' area section, set:

• Exam password: Will be displayed to students (along with a button to copy it) only after they have initiated their monitoring session and the SEM session start time is reached. Ensure that the password (if pasting from the Canvas quiz settings) does not contain leading or trailing spaces.
• Exam Instructions: These become visible to students only after they have initiated their monitoring session and the SEM session start time is reached. Instructors can write any special instructionsstudents would need once taking their exam.
• General Instructions: These become visible to students only after students have initiated their monitoring session but before the SEM session start time is reached. Instructors can write any standard instructions relating to the exam or the students monitoring set up.

Instructors can then select the options for monitoring:

• Camera: Monitor students using their device webcam. Cannot be disabled at this time.
• Screen: Monitors and records all the student's onscreen activity. Cannot be disabled at this time.
• Audio: Monitors student audio. Cannot be disabled at this time.
• Secondary Camera: An option for increased security on exams where students enable an external webcam or their mobile device as additional monitoring. Not available at this time.
• Area Recording: Require students to make a recording of their surroundings to demonstrate a clean exam-taking environment. Optional.
• Allowed sites: Websites that students can access and not be flagged for by the screen monitoring. Enter 1 per line. 
  • Note: addtional urls can be added after attempts to clear unwanted alerts that are appearing during proctoring reviews.

Then click Save.

When you are ready, sessions can be made available to students by toggling the Open to students slider. This will allow students to access the session and begin their SEM setup process but they would still only be able to see the quiz url and password once the start time is reached.

Already created sessions also allow instructors to:

• Edit: Make any changes to the session.
• Proctor: Review and/or monitor students in-session.
• Delete (the session)

Once a session is toggled to open and the students pass across the link in Canvas that opens the app and performs their device validation, they will be able to click the Take Exam button:

Recommended practices: 

• Multiple SEM sessions may be created within the same module link for different exam windows or accommodations. Each sessions should have unique names for diverting the flow of attempts (e.g. image below):

• If instructors want to control student access to different tools (ie. not rely on them to select the correct exam session), this can be set up using multiple SEM tools created in separate modules and then controlling which students can see the links in the different modules using 'Assign to' using either the course sections or more flexibly using differentiation tags:
  
  
• Single SEM sessions should not to exceed 600 students as any more than this may result in slower load times when using the proctoring view.

Click here to view learn more about the student experience with SEM.

The following recordings cover the latest Canvas Learning Opportunities delivered for Wave 2 of the U of A LMS Migration Project in December 2024:

• Workshop #1: Creating your Course Using the UofA Canvas Template
  
  
• Workshop #2: Building and Grading Assessments for your Course in Canvas
  
  
• Workshop #3: Canvas Features to Maximize Student Engagement

The December 2024 French recordings are now also available:

• Atelier 1 : Créez votre cours à l’aide du gabarit en français de l’Université de l’Alberta
  
  
• Atelier 2 : Créez et notez des évaluations dans vos cours sur Canvas
  
  
• Atelier 3 : Exploitez les fonctions de Canvas qui maximisent l'engagement étudiant
  
  

These additional videos were recorded during the U of A's Canvas Learning Opportunities in August 2024. 

1. Getting Started 

2. Authoring Content

3. Communicating with Students

4. Creating Assignments and Rubrics

5. Using Student Groups

6. Integrating Videos

7. Integrating Google Drive

8. Constructing Quizzes

9. Building Modules

10. Setting Up and Using Gradebook

Similar to the mechanisms in eClass, there are several ways to track student progress in Canvas courses. The basic way involves a visual indicator, per student, of their progress through course modules, analogous to the Completion Progress Block. Note that in Canvas, module completion tracking does not need to be turned on (nor can it be turned off.)

You can also run specific, detailed reports in the New Analytics tool within your Canvas course, which is analogous to the Reports functionality in eClass.

Module Progress

You can view each student's progress in your course through the Modules. This is accessed from the Modules main page via View Progress near the top right:

This information includes visual indicators of whether students have viewed or interacted with any trackable items in your course.

For more information on accessing module reports, please see the Canvas KB article How do I use modules to view the progress of students?

New Analytics

The New Analytics tool must be enabled in your course before it can be used under the navigation options in the course settings. Once enabled, it is accessed from the course left navigation menu:

Within the New Analytics tool interface, you can view detailed reports covering:

• Course Grades
• Weekly Online Activity
• Student access stats
• Reports, which specifically include:
  • Missing Assignments
  • Late Assignments
  • Excused Assignments
  • Class Roster (summary)
  • Course Activity (a tabulated and detailed version of the access stats graph mentioned above)
  • Online Attendance (the days your students accessed your course)

For detailed information regarding New Analytics, please visit: https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/tkb-p/Instructor#NewAnalytics

Just like in eClass, instructors can add external LTI tools or apps that link out to online educational tools into their Canvas courses. This is not required for the existing institutionally-licensed tools which are already added to Canvas and available for use: Zoom, YuJa, Talis Library Reading Lists, Assign2, Smart Exam Monitor, Google Assignments, Approved Student Accommodations, and Willo Labs 1.1. Instructions for using any of these and all other pre-existing site-wide tools can be found below.

This article guides instructors in adding personally licensed or free-to-use apps into their particular course(s) but also on the governance process (which is still being finalized) for requesting app integrations for wider usage, be it the entire campus or specific sub-units.
 

Adding Basic LTI 1.1 Apps

Any external apps that use the LTI 1.1 specification can be added to courses using the following vendor-supplied information:

• Consumer Key
• Shared Secret
• Launch URL

Using this information, instructors can enter their course settings, navigate to the 'Apps' tab, and add the External App following the instructions in this article. Note that if the documentation provided by an app or tool vendor mentions 'Developer Keys' are using the LTI 1.3 specification (see below).

Since all LTI tools have automatic data flows from the LMS, before adding tools to their courses instructors should review IST's Security and Privacy checklist and have the integration reviewed if necessary. If you are unsure whether this is required, please reach out to the Senior IT Partner for your college or faculty.

Alternative methods to Add LTI 1.1 External Apps

To make the process easier, Canvas also lets instructor add External Apps using these other options:

• URL - https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-configure-an-external-app-for-a-course-using-a-URL/ta-p/884
• XML - https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-configure-an-external-app-for-a-course-using-XML/ta-p/1080
• Client ID - https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-configure-an-external-app-for-a-course-using-a-client/ta-p/1071
• LTI 2 Registration URL - https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-configure-an-external-app-for-a-course-using-an-LTI-2/ta-p/1153

Adding LTI 1.3 Apps to Canvas

Apps that use the LTI 1.3 specification (ones that require developer keys) cannot be added manually to courses without first being added site-wide by IST Canvas administrators. Once added globally, it is then possible for tools to be deployed only in specific course contexts so instructors can use tools that they have licensed only for their course use. All apps that are added site-wide are REQUIRED to pass through a review process and through governance approval through the Digital Teaching Learning and Student Experience Steering Committee

The governance process is still being formalized but the basic steps involved are:

• Submit the IST Technology Opportunity Proposal form for a determination of internal alignment and fit with the U of A's existing Digital Learning environment by the DTLSESC; if this passes:
• The eClass Support performs basic tool review and initial technical evaluation using a Canvas test server; if this passes:
• The requester submits the app for a security and privacy review; if this passes:
• The tool is reviewed by the DTLSESC and the VP Learning Initiatives for final approval; if this passes:
• The tool gets installed in Canvas and released to courses based on the governance guidelines provided.

Note that tool requests may be rejected based on a number of factors including existing overlapping functionality, technical or security concerns, problems with scope or costing models, etc. 

Using External Apps in Courses

Once added as apps, 1.1 or 1.3 tools can be used in courses in several ways:

• They can be added as direct links in modules by selecting the + icon, then selecting External Tool;
• Embedded in pages using the RTE editor;
• Selected as the submission type in assignments;
• or directly into the course left nav panel (if the tool allows it.)

The existing pre-installed institutionally-licensed University tools (listed below) can be used in courses in all these same methods. 

Existing (and In-Progress) LTI Tools in Canvas

Additional notes

• For course-installed tools, instructors should seek technical support from the tool vendor. Since most LTI tools act as pass-throughs to external applications, IST Support can only troubleshoot within Canvas. Please provide any vendor LTI documentation if contacting the eClass team.

This article will outline the basics for creating assignments and then cover some of Canvas assignments' advanced and new features. Please see Canvas Community KB articles about assignments for in-depth information and a detailed FAQ.

Creating an assignment

In your course tabs to the left, click on the "Assignments" tab to go to the Assignments page:

To create any assignment click the +Assignments button to create a new assignment:

On the assignments page, if you have already set up grade weightings for your course through Assignment groups, you will see these categories displayed (and should take note of which the assignment should be added to.) It is recommended that you set up your assignment groups (grade weightings) to correspond to your syllabus at the outset of course creation - adding these throughout the term can confuse students trying to track their progress.

For information on setting up grade weights, see Weighting Grades in Canvas.

Once you have decided whether to group your assignments, you can also move groups and assignments between and within groups by clicking and holding the eight dots to the left of the assignment name:

Basic Assignment Settings

• Assignment Name: Give your assignment a clear and descriptive name.
• Description: Add instructions, guidelines, and any necessary information for the assignment in the description box.
• Assignment Group: Assign the assignment to a specific group if you have categorized your assignments.
• Points: Set the total points for the assignment. Points can be displayed in a variety of formats:

Note: you can set the points to equal the simple weight of the assignment for the final grade or set the points to any other value and weight its module group. 

• Submission Type: Choose how students will submit their work (e.g., online, external tool, on paper, etc.). See below for more details.
• Submission Attempts: Choose how many attempts students are allowed for the assignment (if applicable).
• Group assignment: Choose whether to set a group assignment and whether students submit as a group or individually.
• Peer reviews: Choose manually or automatically whether students will review each others’ work.
• Assign to: Choose whether to assign to the whole class, an individual student, a course group, or a course section.
• Due Date: Set the due date and time for the assignment.
• Available From: Optionally, set the date and time when the assignment will be available to students.
• Available Until: Optionally, set the date and time when the assignment will no longer be available to students.
• Add Additional Options: You might have additional options like enabling anonymous grading or allowing late submissions.

Just below the area for Assignment description and instructions are buttons that show keyboard shortcuts, an accessibility checker, the number of words in the description area, view HTML code, switch to full screen, and resize the frame:

Assignment Submission Type Options

The submission type could be set to either 'Text entry' or 'File Uploads' for a basic submissions (but not both.) It is possible to limit file uploads to specific file types, but it is not possible to limit the number of files that can be uploaded. If this is required, instructors can also create Canvas quizzes containing File upload questions that DO have the option of limiting files (though these cannot be graded using the SpeedGrader™ annotation tool.) Quizzes can also be used to create 'assignments' that contain both online text entry and file upload questions.

Other options include:

• Links to a student's website,
• Media recordings created with YuJa or Canvas Studio,
• Student annotations on a document uploaded by the instructor:

Instructors can also add a variety of external tool assignment types:

• Assign2: a collaborative assessment tool to streamline grading,
• Canvas Studio: a video submission option,
• Google Assignments: an option to collect, analyze, and grade student work with Google Assignments,
• Quizzes: Add quizzes via external tool to control visibility (for use with SEM),
• Smart Exam Monitor: a proctoring tool for audio, camera, and screen capture that would be added in conjunction with a quiz,
• YouTube: a video submission option,
• YuJa Media: a video submission option.
• Wooclap: a student-response system (SRS) that collects live feedback and quiz answers from lectures.
• Feedback Fruits: an advanced peer grading tool.

Once 'External tool' is selected in the 'Submission type', these tools are accessible by scrolling through the external tool dropdown:

Save or Save & Publish

Once you've filled in all the necessary details, you can Save the assignment as a draft if you're not ready to publish it or Save and Publish it immediately.

Monitor and Grade Submissions (Using Speedgrader)

After publishing the assignment, you can monitor student submissions, provide feedback, and grade their work directly within Canvas with SpeedGrader™. The options to do this within the Speedgrader view depend on the Submission type and whether any advanced grading features are used.

Important note: there is the potential for data loss if more than one Teacher or TA is grading the same student at the same time so this should be avoided. See the suggestion below for filtering speedgrader by TA sections and/or the guidelines in Managing the Gradebook in Large Courses. 

SpeedGrader™ will be available in the top right in every published graded assignment (including quizzes or graded discussions):

It is possible to open Speedgrader pre-sorted to a particular student from within the gradebook in their individual cell:

SpeedGrader™ is a grading interface that allows instructors to assign a grade manually or by a rubric. If the submission type is a file upload or a student annotation, instructors can add comments and markup directly onto a student's submissions to an assignment.

You can search for a specific student in the SpeedGrader by using CTRL+F (Windows OS) or CMD+F (Mac OS) and typing in the student's name. Ensure to do this with the dropdown set to "Showing:All Sections" on the top right drop-down for participant names:

The dropdown can also be useful for TAs to sort the list to their individual section or sections:

Important Note - grading via the SpeedGrader™ automatically notifies students when new scores or comments are added unless they are hidden:

Some advanced grading features include:

• Moderated grading: where multiple individuals can grade an assignment,
• Rubrics: guided expectations for assignment grading,
• Peer review: where students assess each other's work.
• Downloading assignments in bulk and then re-uploading after grading.

Using the Grader Annotation Tools

When adding annotations to a student submission in the SpeedGrader™, you have various options such as comments, highlighted and struck-through text, text boxes, area annotations, and drawings. Each type of annotation should be clear from its icon or other graphical element.

IMPORTANT: When using the Drawing tool to make annotations on student submissions, individual annotations must be saved by clicking the checkmark icon over the drawing. If it is not saved each time, when you try to delete the last annotation, it will delete all the annotations made so far due to the default grouping behaviour.

For more information, see, How do I add annotated comments in student submissions using DocViewer in SpeedGrader™?

Additional Usage Notes for Canvas Assignments

This section will highlight some key points to consider when deploying and grading assignments in Canvas, particularly behaviours that are different from the eClass system.

Reopening assignments/allowing re-submission

The Canvas system does not have a mechanism to allow resubmission of assignments. Even system administrators are unable to reset a submission once it's been made by a student. There are two workarounds that can be used if a student needs to resubmit an assignment to have it graded in the SpeedGrader™:

- Adjust the assignment settings to allow additional attempts; This setting unfortunately can't be applied to a single user, only all users that the assignment is assigned to

or
- Duplicate the assignment, and assign the duplicate only to the student(s) resubmitting. This will need to be accounted for in the gradebook as well, the easiest way is likely to excuse the grade on the duplicate and transfer the grade manually to the original assignment. 

Grading and delivering feedback

When grading assignments, most instructors will want to first set a manual grading policy in the gradebook or to individually hide the grades from within the SpeedGrader™ (as shown above). If instructors don't do that, the annotations and comments in the SpeedGrader™ will be immediately available to students. Saved comments in particular will trigger a notification on the main course page. 

Group Assignments

Group assignments should only be open for submission once group memberships are established in the group set. Students can be added to groups retroactively but if they've submitted as an individual, there is no way to harmonize those submissions. If the group has already submitted, the submission is deleted when the individual is added.
To prevent confusion or submission by individuals, assignments can be assigned to the groups in the corresponding group set rather than 'everyone' but note that this will prevent the assignment from showing at all to ungrouped students:

When grading a group assignment, if the option "Assign grades to each student individually" is not checked, there is no way to override a single student's grade without changing the grade of all of their group members, even from the gradebook. To workaround, it is safe to enable/disable the setting retroactively. 

Special note about group assignments and SpeedGrader annotations: Currently, only the student who submitted a group assignment can see the SpeedGrader document annotations. While all the group members do receive the overall assignment comment, the in-document annotations are only visible to the submitter. The vendor is aware of this issue and this is the expected behavior in Canvas at this time.

Canvas provides a basic tool to recover inadvertently deleted content in a course to maintain continuity in a course. This article will outline the basics for restoring deleted items and the limitations of this process.

This feature is not as robust as the point-in-time-recovery (PITR) mechanism available for eClass which could roll courses or content back to a particular point but this tool will recover important content like assignments, quizzes, pages, and more. 

Restoring a Deleted Item

1. Navigate to the specific course from which the item was deleted.
2. In the address bar of your browser, add "/undelete" to the end of your course's URL. For example:
   
3. After navigating to the /undelete page, you will see a list of items that can be restored.
4. Select the item you wish to restore by selecting Restore 
   
5. Then select OK 

Additional Information

Typically, the following items can be restored using the Undelete feature:

• Pages
• Assignments (including submissions and grades)
• Quizzes (When restored, the quiz will be unpublished - grades and submissions can be restored by publishing the quiz)
• Discussion Posts
• Announcements
• Files
• Rubrics
• Modules
• Assignment Group

The following items cannot be restored using the Undelete feature:

• Individual discussion post replies
• Conferences
• Item banks

Limitations

• The Undelete feature displays up to 25 items of each type. To view more items, you may need to restore some items first.
• This feature is not officially supported by Canvas and should be thought of a 'best effort' recovery.

Alternative Restoration Methods

In situations where the /undelete feature does not suffice, other methods can be used:

1. GradeBook History:

   • If a grade is accidentally deleted, instructors can view the GradeBook history to see previous grades and manually update them.

2. Page History:

   • For pages, instructors can view the page history to restore a previous version of the page.

Basic Information

There are 2 main use cases when instructors will need to adjust the timing of quizzes for certain students:

1. In advance of the quiz delivery when students have approved accommodations they have registered for that course or assessment;
2. Or: during or after an attempt in the case of a student who has experienced some form of interruption during their attempt - technical issues, disruptions in their physical, environment, health issues, etc.

These 2 processes are both accessed in the same area of the quiz Build interface so instructors should review the scenarios and workflows carefully.

Setting Accommodations for Quizzes

In advance of attempts, it is possible to add student accommodations for single quizzes or for all the quizzes in a course, both by adding extra time, additional attempts, or reduce answer choices. The moderation is applied from within a quiz but from there can be configured to only affect that student's settings for that one quiz or to apply the changes to every quiz.

To moderate a quiz by adding time or attempts, click on any quiz in the Quizzes list and go to the Build interface:

Then click on the Moderate tab:

Then click on the student's name which will open the Course Accommodation panel:

Note the alert that "These settings will be applied to all the quizzes in this course for this student except for the already in-progress attempts."

For this student, for all quizzes in the course, the possible time adjustments are 'None,' 'Give additional time' in hours and minutes, 'Remove time limit(unlimited)' to allow unlimited time to complete quizzes, and 'Time limit multiplier':

Selecting Additional time or Multiplier will open entry boxes to specify those values:

Only one type of time adjustment can be added for each student, ie. at the course level, a student can have additional time or a multiplier but not both. It is possible to amend these values for this student when making on-the-fly adjustments (see below).

It is also possible to set Reduced answer choices for a student which removes one possible choice from any multiple choice question and to attempt to apply these changes to any in-progress attempts. See below for more details about that.

Once instructors click Save to confirm these accommodations for this student, they will be listed in the Accommodations column for that student. This will appear in all the quizzes in the course:

Important warning: If a quiz has an ‘Assign To’ Until Time set, that deadline overrides any extra time you give students , whether it’s for accommodations or for disruptions during the exam (as per the next section). For example, if students are given a 2-hour block for a synchronous exam, the Until time will cut off access at the end of that block, even if a student still had extra time left. The following quiz would close at 11AM, regardless of any additional time set for specific students:

To accomplish this, there would need to be an additional 'Assign Access' Until Time added for any students with extended time:

In small courses, these additional Assign To times can be added manually for each student but for large courses, it is possible to use Differentiation Tags to create a tag group for a particular accommodation, eg. '2.5X Time', tag the students who require that accommodation, and then create an Assign To time for that tag.

Adjusting In-progress Quiz Attempts

If a student needs changes to an in-progress quiz attempt  this is also done in the Moderate area within the quiz Build interface:

Existing course-level time accommodations will be listed under the Accommodations column; time adjustments for this specific quiz are added by clicking the pencil icon to the right of the disrupted student:

From the 'Current Quiz Accommodation' interface, you have the option to add Time adjustments:

Additional time can be added before the start of the quiz or to new attempts, and can be added in minutes or hours. Also, time limits can be removed entirely:

Once added, any quiz time adjustments will be added to the 'Accommodations' column: 

Important note: giving extra time to a student during an in-progress attempt is possible, but it is limited by any “Until” time set on the quiz. To ensure students can continue and receive their full time, the Until time must also be extended for that student. If the Until time is changed, the student must also close (but not submit) the quiz and then re-enter it in order to see the updated time (see screenshot above.)

Re-opening or Allowing More Quiz Attempts:

Re-Opening Attempts:

Re-opening a quiz only works if the student’s original time limit has not already elapsed, ie. if they submitted early themselves. Re-opening does not add extra time to the quiz and it will follow the existing time settings. So if the quiz was submitted when the time expired, or it is after the Until time is reached, re-opening the quiz will have no effect.  Instructors will see a warning that re-opening a quiz does not extend the allowed time and that the current settings remain in effect:

Reopening a quiz and giving extra time to a student during an in-progress attempt is possible, but it is limited by any “Until” time set on the quiz. To ensure students can continue and receive their full time, the Until time must also be extended for that student. If the Until time is changed, the student must close (but not submit) the quiz and then re-enter it in order to see the updated time.

Allowing Additional Attempts:

If the quiz attempt is submitted AND the time limit has expired or the until time has passed, instructors can add an additional attempt(s) for a student. Once again, the "Until" time would superseded any additional attempts created so any students requiring additional attempts would need to have "Until" time extensions added (see screenshot above.)

The available options in canvas are to provide an additional attempt that is a brand new attempt on the quiz. The only method to allow a student to have an additional attempt and continue with their existing attempt is to enable Allow Multiple Attempts in the quiz-level settings, set the attempts allowed to '1' (so that other students do not get additional tries), and then Enable build on last attempt.

Important note: using this combination of settings will REMOVE any correctly answered questions from the student's new attempt.

Additional Notes:

• Only one 'Give additional time' allowance can be added for each student; if a student is in danger of running out of time a second time, the additional time CAN be edited (or the time limit can be removed.)
• There is no bulk option to add accommodations or additional time for students on the Moderate page (and no group overrides options exist.) It is possible to build different 'Assign Access' time slots for sets of students using Differentiation Tags.

Moderating A Classic Quiz

Once a Classic quiz has been published, you will get a right-hand sidebar item, Moderate this quiz.

To moderate a quiz,

1. Click on the Classic quiz name in the Quizzes section of your course.

2. Click on the link Moderate this quiz:

3. Click on the pencil icon to the right of a student's name:

4. If you need to add the same moderation to multiple students, click the check boxes beside the students, and then click the link, 'Change extensions for <n> students':

5. Enter the additional time and attempts for the student:

6. Check the box to “Manually unlock the quiz for the next attempt” if the student is taking the quiz before or after the time range set in the quiz, i.e., outside of the "Available From /Until" setting.

Note: Manually unlocking the quiz means the quiz has no end date for the selected student.

7. If the time on a timed quiz has expired, the moderation Time column will display the message Time Up! 

8. Unsubmitted quizzes will be flagged. Click to check them, and Submit if you wish to score them.

Notes:

• Adding extra time to an in-progress Classic quiz is not possible. Existing students' attempts will be completed at the original time limit or duration, even if extra time is added. If settings are changed, new options will not apply until the student has completed the current attempt. It is possible to Re-open completed attempts for selected students after their attempt closes and then have any extra time added.

Assign2 allows students to complete solutions for long-form problems on paper and photograph or scan them to upload as their assessment submission. For in-person exams, the tool can be used to create exam booklets containing the exam questions and a form students complete to identify their work. These are then scanned and uploaded back into the tool for grading.

New in October 2025, the vendor has released 2 beta assessment types that instructors can take advantage of: AnyExam and Coding Assignment. Information for using these new features is below. 

Creating a Canvas Assign2 Assignment

1. First, make certain that Assignments are not visible in your course navigation Settings:

2. Create and set up an Assignment.

Note: Be sure to set an availability date in the assignment or the Assign2 settings as students could open Assign2 early from the Grade book. Do not set a due date, as the submissions will be marked as submitted when the grades are pushed, not when the students submit. Put the due date in the assignment description and set it within assign2 to enforce it. 

As well, leave the submission attempts set to "Unlimited". This should also be controlled within Assign2 rather than the Canvas assignment settings (limiting attempts won't cause an issue for students but will prevent you from pushing grades from the tool more than once).


3. Add the Assign2 LTI to it:

• For Submission Type, choose External Tool.
  
• Click Find.
• In the configuration dialog, select 'Assign 2', then click Select:

4. Check the box ‘Load this tool in a new tab’.
5. Save and Publish the assignment.
6. Once you have saved the assignment, click on ‘Load <assignment name> in a new window.’

Configuring Assign2

Assign2 can be configured in 3 different ways. These options are the same ones available for eClass and are described in detail in the following articles:

1. Creating Online Homework Assignments Using Assign2

Instructors can create online homework assessments using the Assign2 external tool in their eClass course. Assign2 allows students to capture long-form written work as image files that can be uploaded for instructors to mark online using a time-saving interface. 

2. Creating In-Class Paper (PDF) Exams to be Graded Online Using Assign2

Instructors can create PDF exam forms to grade exams or assignments completed on paper by students in class.

3. Delivering Group Paper (PDF) Exams Using Assign2

Instructors can deliver 2-stage (group) exams using the 'In class PDF Assessment (Beta)' workflow in Assign2. This method of exam delivery allows students to take the exam individually at first and then take a second version of the exam as a group to discuss as peers to come to a consensus or debate about the correct answers. All students in the group then receive the same mark for the combined part of the assessment (most often some lesser proportion of the overall grade than their original assessment score.) General setup and grading General Assign2 setup instructions are available at Managing Student Assignments in Assign2. Help with grading Assign2 submissions is available Marking Student Submissions in Assign2.

Attempt management and grading

Instructions on how to manage Assign2 assessments are available at Managing Student Assignments in Assign2.

Details for grading in Assign2 are available at Marking Student Submissions in Assign2.

Important note: Unlike eClass, When pushing grades from Assign2, you should first click the "Update users from LMS" button from the student roster page; otherwise, grades may not be pushed to the Canvas grade book.

Note: Grades will not be pushed from Assign2 if a Canvas assignment or quiz is unpublished. 

Additional Assign2 Assessment types

Edufide has added 2 new assessment types that instructors can begin using. Both are launching October 1st and are being released as open beta offerings so any user feedback can be reported to support@edufide.com. The vendor has provided user documentation (below) and is providing direct support during the open beta phase so if users have any questions during the set up and configuration of assessments or encounter any problems during release and grading, those can be directed to that support@edufide.com.  

Any Exam (beta)

This assessment type allows instructors to upload and grade in-person student work without pre-creating booklets - the only requirement is that each student's work is identified by a cover sheet that contains some student identifier.

Using the Assign2 AnyExam Assessment Type

Coding Assignment (beta)

This assessment type allows instructors to configure environments for students to submit computer code that can be automatically marked agains predefined test.

Creating an Assign2 Coding Assignment Assessment Type

Submitting Assign2 Coding Assignments (For Students)

Online Quiz (alpha)

New in January 2026, Assign2 is releasing an integrated online quiz tool that instructors can use to auto-grade long form essay answers using structured AI rubrics. The new modality also features a range of additional question types including STACK.

Creating Structured Quiz Assessments

Most notable is that it is NOT possible to have anonymous groups - if placed in groups, students will be able to see and interact with their group mates and use all the features available on the groups home page. This CANNOT be disabled.

New in August 2025, Canvas has introduced new functionality called Differentiation Tags to cover some of the different use cases provided by groups in eClass. See below for usage information.

Functional Differences Between Canvas and Moodle

Creating Groups (Canvas how-to articles)

The basic practices for creating groups are well documented in the Canvas guides:

• Creating Group Sets (including auto-creation of groups in a set)
• Creating a Single Group in a Set
• Importing Groups (via CSV)
• Additional Information on groups

Additional notes:

• When creating groups, it is possible to specify group leaders who can control membership (add/remove users) and edit the group name.
• Since students have access to an area that shows their groups across courses, instructors should add a short course code identifying their course in front of the group name when auto-creating groups (eg. Math 101 - Group...)

Group Self-Sign Up

It is possible to allow students to easily sign up for a group; however, this option will only be available to students if the People in the course left navigation tab is visible.

• Creating Self-Sign Up Groups.

When students visit the People tab, they will see groups with the option to join.

Group Home Page Functions

Once groups have been created, students in them will have access to a Group Home Page with functions similar to those found at the course level. The Group Home Page cannot be disabled. Group home pages are always visible to and can be moderated by course instructors.

• Home: a homepage landing screen that populates with a feed of any activities from the sub-functions below, eg. discussion topics, collaborations.

• Announcements: Important messages that should go to all group members can be posted. Any messages posted wil send a notifcation email message.

• Pages: Group members can create shared pages using the Canvas RCE editor.

• People: The list of group members.

• Discussions: Discussion topics added to the group.

• Files: Files uploaded and shared with the group.

• Collaborations: Shared editable google docs. The docs are owned by the creator with all other group members added as editors.

Group Assignments

When configuring an assignment as a group assignment, it's important to have groups established prior to publishing, and in order to prevent submissions from ungrouped students, assign it to groups rather than everyone. For details, see the note in the KB article Using Canvas Assignments.

It is not possible to assign quizzes or assignments only to a specific group. This can be accomplished with differentiation tags.

Differentiation Tags

This function in Canvas allows instructors to create functional groupings of students in their courses as an alternative to manipulating course Sections or using Groups.

Differentiation Tags are managed in the People section of a course.

Adding Tags

Click Manage Tags, then Get Started:

This tag could now be used in the Assign to box of any assignment to make that item visible ONLY to the students who are tagged:

It is also possible to build sets of tags to further organize the tags for use cases where students would all be sorted into one particular tag within the set. This is done in the same 'Create tag' interface by entering a first Tag Name and then clicking + Add another tag:

This will expand the interface and allow users to enter additional tags and then enter the Tag Set Name:

These can be added to students in the same way and they are then displayed under the set in the Manage Tags overlay:

Viewing Student's Tags

Using Tags

When making assignments, tag sets make it easy to see and assign different due dates:

Additional Notes/Known Issues:

• Each course is limited to 40 tags total and 10 variants per tag set.
• There is no limit to the total number of tags a student can have; however, a student can only be assigned one tag per tag set.
• Instructors will see an error if they try to add tags to students who have enrollments in more than 1 section in a course. This bug has been resolved.
• When assigning content to groups created with differentiation tags, if tag membership is changed, students will retain their access to pages and discussions assigned to their previous tag. This has been reported to the vendor and repairs are underway.

Creating a video quiz

Instructors, teaching assistants (TAs), and designers can create quizzes from their My Library page in Studio.

• You can only create Studio quizzes from videos in My Library
• Studio quizzes support Multiple Choice, True/False, and Multiple Answer question types.
• Studio quizzes do not support more than 50 questions in a quiz. Quizzes with more than 50 questions cannot be edited and may not display properly for students.
• Multiple quizzes can be added to a media file.

1. To get started, click on the three dots beside the video you want and select Create Quiz:

2. Give your quiz a title and description:

- Choosing ‘Hide question markers on the timeline for students’ will encourage students not to jump to questions and skip parts of the video.
- Choosing ‘Allow displaying annotations on the timeline for students’ will display the inline comments and notes that you have placed on the video.

3. Click Get Started to begin adding questions.

4. To add questions, pause the video at the point where you wish to add a question and click the plus (+):

5. Add a question, answer choices, set shuffling, and any answer feedback (scroll down for incorrect answer feedback). Important Note: Shuffle Choices should always be selected - otherwise the correct answer is always displayed first.

6. Save when finished.

7. Click Done at the top right of the video to create your quiz:

8. You can also use the gear icon to update the quiz settings if desired.

The Canvas support portal also has additional details about adding quizzes and questions. 

Grading

To use your quiz as a graded item in a course, you must add an External tool assignment and set it to Canvas Studio. Any quiz created in My Library from Studio can be added as a grade item.

Note: Once a version of a quiz has been used in an Assignment, it cannot be edited.

1. To add a video quiz as a grade item, create an Assignment.

2. Switch the 'Submission type' to External Tool:

3. Choose 'Load This Tool In A New Tab' and click Find.

4. From the 'Configure External Tool' dialogue, choose Canvas Studio, and click Select:

Choose your video from the 'Link Resource from External Tool' dialogue:

6. When the video has been selected, select Video quiz embed then click Embed:

7. Save.

Note: The quiz will stop whenever there is an embedded question.

8. Once Published, you can test the quiz from Student View.

9. If the Assignment tab is hidden from students, add the assignment to a visible Module.

Non-gradable quizzes

Non-gradable video quizzes may be added to perform formative assessment.

To embed the quiz in your class:

1. Create an Assignment
2. Click the plugin icon and select Canvas Studio (select View All if Studio is not visible)

3. Choose the desired quiz from My Library.
4. Click Video quiz embed.
5. Click Embed.

6. You may type a description if required.
7. Change the display Grade as drop-down to 'Not Graded':

8. If the Assignment tab in the left navigation is hidden from students, make the quiz available by adding the assignment to a visible Module.

When students take the quiz, the video will pause during each question.

Adding annotations

Instructors can add permanent notes and details to videos by annotating videos. Annotations will remain associated with a video even across courses (as opposed to adding comments). To add annotations:

1. Click the three-dots menu beside a video and choose Annotate Video:

2. Add an annotation by pausing the video and then clicking the plus (+) at the bottom left of the video.

4. Give a headline (title) and description for the annotation.

5. Type a URL to a website (optional).

Videos will automatically pause on each annotation. Users may navigate directly to the annotation by clicking on the circle.

Annotated videos can be added in any Rich Content Editor area in your course and (if selected) will also appear in any video quizzes.

Common examples for this are when instructors are using spreadsheets to perform complex grade calculations or when an exam has been optically scored by IST Test Scoring & Questionnaire Services (TSQS) and they have provided a spreadsheet file containing the test results (which will be demonstrated below.)

New in October 2025: It is now possible to mass import comments from TSQS optically scored tests or any text-based csv into Canvas. Learn more in Bulk Uploading Comments and Grades into the Canvas Gradebook.

New in December 2025: The TSQS scantron export csv files can now be directly imported into Canvas with no reconfiguration.

Grade Import/Export Basics

Grade uploads into Canvas require a specific format of the data in CSV files for import that includes 4 columns to identify students and the grades to be imported. When importing, all of the identifier column headings and the 'Points Possible' row are required to be in the spreadsheet, even if the columns contains no data.

The recommended process to create a model spreadsheet for maintaining grades outside the LMS is to start by exporting the gradebook: go to Grades and click Export in the top right corner. It does not make any difference which option, current view or entire, you choose from the dropdown:

When opened in Excel (or any spreadsheet editor) your CSV file will look like this:

The Student column contains the student's preferred full name in the format 'last name', 'first name'.

The ID column contains Canvas internal user ID for the student.

The SIS User ID column maps to the student's ID number.

The SIS Login ID column maps to the student's CCID.

If adding grades to this spreadsheet for uploadYou can delete any empty downloaded (or previously uploaded) columns for assignments or quizzes. Do not delete any of the first five columns (Student, ID, SIS User ID, SIS Login ID, or Section.)

If working in Excel, be aware that the the program will always attempt to trim any leading zeros in student ID numbers (SIS User ID) which can cause issues when saving the file as csv for import. Changing the formatting on that column to 'text' will resolve this issue.

See the section below for the process to upload spreadsheet files containing grades.

Uploading grades

To upload grades, click Import at the top right of your Grades page:

On the next page, choose the CSV you want to upload and click Upload data:

If you are uploading grades/columns that already existed in the spreadsheet you exported, these should map immediately and you can verify that the grades you wanted to upload are displayed:

If you are repeating a grade upload, grades that have not changed since the last upload will not be displayed. If you are satisfied with the upload preview, click Save changes:

Finally, click OK to acknowledge and complete the upload:

Importing TSQS Grade Files

Files provided to instructors by TSQS after exam scanning can now be directly imported into Canvas without making any changes to the file. Instructors will need to map the 'Grades' column from the spreadsheet to a new assignment (if they have not yet created one for this exam): 

Or select the existing column to map to (if they have already created it):

In both cases, if the 'Version', 'Items Wrong', and 'Scored Responses' columns from the TSQS export should be set to 'Bogus, ignore it'. Comments cannot be uploaded directly using Canvas' built-in processes but instructors can use the Bulk Comment Uploaderto import comments and/or grades into the gradebook.

Clicking Continue will trigger the process and report any changes or issues. In large courses there can sometimes be a delay before all grades are uploaded.

Manually building Import Files

This section describes how instructors can manually build import files that can be imported into Canvas. This process is demonstrated using the steps formerly required to import TSQS grade files into Canvas (but is no longer required as these can now be directly imported.)

When students take a quiz using Scantron bubble sheets, you will receive a csv file from TSQS with the quiz results. Unfortunately, the Scantron CSV file format must be tweaked before it can be imported into the Canvas gradebook.

The Scantron CSV has two fields for student names instead of the one field required by Canvas. It also has different field names for handling student numbers and CCIDs, and no row for 'Points possible':

To prevent mismatches and/or issues with students not present in the TSQS spreadsheet, the recommended practice is to paste the TSQS data into an exported Canvas gradebook file (shown above.) Instructors need to copy only the fields highlighted below from the TSQS csv file:

The data from the Student number and CCID columns should be pasted into the columns for SIS User ID, and SIS Login ID, respectively. The data from the Canvas CSV under Student, ID and Section must be deleted. This will force Canvas to map the scores directly to the users included in the file:

Once saved, this reconstructed TSQS csv file can be imported into the Canvas gradebook as shown below.

Note: Text comments (ie. the 'Items Wrong' and 'Scored Responses' columns) cannot be uploaded into the Canvas gradebook using Canvas' standard import - instructors can use the custom U of A Bulk Uploader tool to meet this need if required.

Usage Notes/Known issues:

• If you are uploading grades into a co-curricular course, if a student hasn't accepted the course invitation and their status is still "Pending", then their grades will not import from a CSV upload. 

If you are enrolled in a Canvas course as a Teacher or a Non-Editing Teacher, you can enroll additional users into your course. (This capability is not available to TAs.) This would be commonly used to add co-instructors or TAs into credit courses or to add students into co-curricular courses (which is not possible in credit courses).

This article covers the basics of enrolling people and details the different permissions available for roles in the U of A's implementation of Canvas.

Enrolling Users

To add users to a course, open the People link from the course left nav, then click on the + People button near the top right:
(Note: If the course settings contain a participation end date that has already passed, this button will not be available until you extend it to a future date.)

Then select a role and identify the users to be added by entering their email address, CCID (Login ID) (recommended), or EMPLID (SIS ID):

For additional instructors, the Section dropdown should be set to the default course section most often. In credit courses, this would be the section that does not contain a Bear Tracks section ID number. Any non-student users who are enrolled in student cohort sections will be dropped if there is a section change in a course. 

In large, multi-section courses with multiple TAs, it may make sense to enroll users directly into the section they will be working with and check the option Can interact with users in their section only to limit their views to specific students when grading assignments or quizzes and working in the gradebook:

Suppose a TA is working with multiple sections. In that case, instructors can limit their grading views to all of those sections by clicking the 3 dots to the right of their name in the People view of the course (once they are enrolled), selecting Edit sections, and choosing any other required sections:

Note: In multi-course sections, the sections must be mapped to sections in Bear Tracks/PeopleSoft, and all of these must be added to a course through the request system when creating the course. Manually created sections, e.g., for functional organization, cannot be added to courses at the University of Alberta (despite what Canvas documentation might suggest) due to potential problems with breaking data linkages to Bear Tracks section enrollment data. New in September 2025, instructors can use Differentiation Tags to accomplish this function.

Course Invitations and Pending Status

Anyone manually enrolled in Canvas courses, for both credit and co-curricular courses, will be listed in the 'Pending' status. If the course is already Published (as ALL credit courses are by default) or if there is no Course start date set, the users will receive an email invitation to the course that they can follow to 'Confirm' their enrollment. They can also confirm their status by clicking on the course invitation on their dashboard or entering the course through a link.

Students enrolled via the Bear Tracks sync do not receive any notifications and their status is confirmed immediately. 

To work around both the automated email send AND the pending status, instructors in co-curricular courses can use the following workaround: 1) enroll students (or colleagues) in an unpublished course (which does not send emails to students), 2) deactivate the users from the 3 dots dropdown in the People page in the course, 3) publish the course, and 4) reactivate the users. This will result in them being fully enrolled in the course and not receive an email inviting them to the course.

Credit Course Student Enrollments

Instructors should never need to enroll students in courses as these are automatically pulled from Bear Tracks based on the section information entered when creating courses. If instructors are missing entire student cohorts that should be in your course, please contact IST eClass support team at 780-492-9372 or eclass@ualberta.ca. If single students are missing, especially those who have recently made registration changes, please be aware that it can take up to 48 hours from the time a student is enrolled in Beartracks by the department until they appear in Canvas.

Instructors should also make sure they are familiar with the processes for making courses available to students.

Enrolling Additional Users in Closed Courses

After the course end date entered in the settings under ‘Participation’, it is no longer possible for instructors or Canvas site admins to enroll users in courses. When they access the People page, they will see the + People button at the top right greyed out:

If it is prior to the sitewide term end date set for the instructor role (see below), instructors can temporarily change the course end date, make the required enrollments, and then change the course end date back so that the course returns to a closed state.

If instructors are concerned about even this short time frame of having their course open to student access, they can leverage the term functionality by switching the course Participation setting to ‘Term’ which will override the previously set course end date with the term end date, then make the enrollments. This should only be done if it is AFTER the standard term end date for students but does not need to be reversed.

Canvas category administrators are also able to change the Participation setting to 'Term' (again, after the standard student term end date has passed) to be able to make additional instructor and designer enrollments in courses.

Canvas Term End Dates

The Term categorization is new functionality that is designed to keep instructor’s dashboards clean (but is separate from any course archiving and retention policies for Canvas which are still being finalized.)

All credit courses created in Canvas are mapped to their appropriate calendar term which all have corresponding end dates for different roles: 

• Instructors: 4 months past the end of the scheduled final exam period for fall and winter terms; 2 months for spring and summer terms.
• Students: The last day of the scheduled final exam period for the term. Note - this date only has takes effect when instructors change the Participation setting to ‘Term’; otherwise students lose access to courses on the course end date specified in the settings.

If instructors cannot change the course end date in the settings, ie. the option is greyed out for them or does not appear at all, the term end date has passed and they will need to contact eClass support or their local canvas Category Administrator to make enrollments or any other changes to the settings on their behalf. If instructors are unaware who their Category Admin is (if their unit has one), they can contact their unit's designated approver for more information.

After the term end date has past, instructors can no longer edit content in the course (by Canvas' design) so they would need to request a new course to begin updating a course for a new term.

Co-curricular Course Student Enrollments and Self-Enrollment

Instructors of co-curricular courses can use the same workflows to enroll additional users but do also have the option of selecting the student role when adding users to their courses. For the Fall term, manually enrolling students is the only method available but different options for managing co-curricular course lists may be available in future terms. This process is the same as described above, the only difference being the option to select student as the role.

New in January 2025, instructors can now enable self-enrollment for their courses. This functionality is currently delivered through a manual process triggered by sending an email request to eClass support, with ongoing plans to further streamline the workflow.

Once enabled by eClass, instructors will see a checkbox in their course settings to enable self-enrollment:

Once the settings are saved, the url will display in the settings and can be shared with prospective students:

This link does not change so instructors can enable and disable self-enrollment by toggling the selection button on or off. Note that if instructors have elected to unpublish their course (see below), students will still be able to enroll, but the course will not appear or be accessible to them on their dashboard until it is published.

Co-curricular courses are also different than credit courses in that instructors can manually toggle courses closed for access using the course Publish functionality before releasing them (which is not required in credit courses). Co-curricular instructors should be aware of this setting when manually enrolling users, since automatic invitation emails will be sent to all enrollees if a course is already published.

If students are enrolled in an unpublished course, they will all receive invitation emails when the course is published.

Available Roles on Canvas

The available roles on Canvas -- Teacher, Non-Editing Teacher, TA, Non-Editing TA (Graders), Designer, Student, and Auditor -- are mapped from the same roles on eClass. The following table provides an overview of these roles with their basic capabilities:

** Students can only be manually added to co-curricular courses - credit course student enrollments are synchronized every 2 hours with the Bear Tracks sections added to a course.

Notes:

• Unlike in eClass, where participants can hold multiple roles, in Canvas, each participant can only have one role per course. 
• It is not possible to change the role of a user manually added to a course - if this is required, the user should be unenrolled, then re-enrolled in the desired role.
• The Designer role cannot access course Item Banks - users need to be enrolled as Teachers to construct quizzes from Item Banks.
• The Auditor is unable to submit quizzes or complete assignments or post in discussions. When viewed in the course participant list under People, the auditors will display 'Observing: No one' as the role name. (This is due to the underlying canvas role archetype and cannot be changed.)
• The Observer role, available in the Roles dropdown, is a default Canvas feature that cannot be disabled. It should not be used for the U of A context.
• If you add an Auditor and then the student's enrollment syncs with Canvas, then the student will have a Student role. However, the Auditor role might be considered "concluded", which will cause issues with grading in Speedgrader. (it will say 'Notice: Concluded Student'.) If that happens, please contact IST eClass Support to fix the enrollment. 

Changing Course Name, Code and Nickname

In Canvas (as opposed to eClass), both the course full name and the course code (short name) can be changed by instructors. Both the full name and course code appear on the course tile on a user's dashboard; the course's full name appears at the top of the course home page and in the global Courses menu in the left nav; and the course code appears at the top of all pages within the course in the breadcrumb trail.

Note that all users (including instructors) can rename courses on their dashboard to keep better track of them.  

To change the names, enter the course settings, adjust the fields, and click Update course details:

Finally, another way to change the name to which your course appears in Canvas (i.e. Calendar, Breadcrumbs, etc), is to change the course nickname. For more information on this, see: Features of the Canvas Dashboard

Changing Course Access Dates

Course Storage Limits

Grade and Assignment Default Settings

Course Navigation Menu

Another important area to configure in the settings is the Navigation tab which controls all the links that are visible in the left side course nav menu:

Full instructions on customizing the course navigation menu can be found here.

Other Settings

Important note: It is not recommended to upload videos as files directly in Canvas (eg, to the "Files" section or as an attached document in a text area), as there is a fixed storage limit of 2GB for all course files and single-file limit of 500 MB per file. Instructors should instead either use either central streaming solution depending on their use case. 

Recommendations for specific use cases

The chart below identifies the recommended streaming solution depending on particular use cases.

Instructors can also embed videos from sites such as YouTube or Vimeo using html embed code and the embed button content areas in Canvas. For videos hosted on YouTube, however, it's preferable to import them to your Studio or Yuja library as this will prevent advertisements from playing and allow you to make full use of the interactive features in these platforms.

Content added to one system can easily be downloaded and loaded into the other, so both can be used depending on your use case. The key features and differences between the two systems are described below.

Yuja Features

Yuja is our recommended platform for lecture recording and long term storage of large libraries. Yuja also has the benefit of complete interoperability with the existing eClass system, and will allow for more seamless transfer of content.

Canvas Studio Features

Studio is our recommended solution for quiz video additions to courses or instances where we intend that students interact heavily with videos.

• Copy To/Send To;
• Import / Export Content;
• or Canvas Commons.

This article outlines all three options and identifies the use cases (and potential issues) associated with each option so that instructors can choose the best option depending on their needs.

Copy To/Send To

These options appear under the ellipsis menu next to quizzes, assignments, pages, external tools such as Yuja, and even entire modules.

Copy to... allows you to copy material directly to another course, and will open a menu to select a course and which module to place the item in:
    

Note: the warning in orange only applies if you'd already copied the same content, and made changes to the copied content in the destination course. 

Send to... will allow you to designate a receiver, who will be able to find the shared item(s) in their user Account menu under Shared content. 

When sending materials, you'll be prompted for the names of individual accounts to share with, you can search by name or CCID and select a user.

The user will see a notification on their account icon indicating that items have been shared with them. 

The notifications can be cleared by marking the items as read or importing them to the user's own courses.

Important Notes:

- Tip: Send To... can be used to send materials to yourself. This can be a convenient method of setting content aside to move later or collect content that will be used in multiple courses.

- Do not use Send To... to send course materials to students! They will not be able to access it this way. The mechanism is only useful for sharing with others (or yourself) and adding content to a course. Instructors should use the "Assign to" options in an assignment's settings or under the ellipsis menu to give student access to specific materials. 

Import/Export

Importing

Instructors can easily move content between courses that they have instructor roles in, or from sandbox courses used to develop content, using the Import Existing Content button found on a course's home page:

Or on the course settings page:

At the next screen, choose "Copy a canvas course" as the content type

Options will then appear to select a course. Similar to in eClass, you'll need to have a teacher role to be able to select the course here.

Note: Selective imports are recommended as Announcements will be copied from a previous course. Timed announcements will trigger emails to students enrolled in the previous course.

Selective imports are also required when importing content from another institution, as some built-in tools will be configured for other institutions and will not work in the UofA instance.

Find the 'Select Content' button next to the course under 'Current Jobs':

Note: There is a known issue when importing quizzes individually- New Quizzes (the recommended format for quizzes) will not appear in the select content menu individually. They can, however, be imported if they are in a module in the source course and the entire module is copied.

Instructors can also use the export function, found on the right-side of the screen in the Settings section of your course, to create a downloadable file that can be saved locally to your computer and re-uploaded to another course page. Exported files will not contain any grades or student data. Instructors needing to download grades specifically can use the export function in the course's gradebook to create a .csv.

Exporting an entire course will result in a .imscc formatted file, exported quizzes themselves will download in a .qti format.

Please see Canvas' documentation for full instructions:

How do I export a Canvas course? 
How do I copy content from another Canvas course using the Course Import tool?

Important notes:

- Only classic quizzes can be exported to a file this way, quizzes made using the new quiz engine will not appear here. 

Sharing via Canvas Commons (beta)

Canvas Commons is a content sharing external tool provided by Canvas and embedded in our instance as a beta tool at this time. It appears in the left global nav and can be used from the ellipsis dropdown at the top right of modules, activities, and resources.

Instructors sharing content to Canvas commons and can select whether to share it only 2 ways:

• Only with themselves (which can be a useful way to store cross-course items); ro
• with the entire University of Alberta community.

Content shared with the entire institution -- currently items created by the Canvas transition project team -- will be visible on the Commons Search page for all U of A instructors and staff (but not students) when users access the tool via the link on the left side of the Canvas interface:

After selecting an item from the search panel, users will see a preview (if one is available) with a button near the top right to Import/Download the content:

Once a particular commons item is used, any updates that are published to that content can easily pulled down wherever that content was used. When users next access Commons, there will be Updates listed in the header and they will see a pop-up alert notifying them that content they have used has been updated:

Clicking on Updates, users will see a list of any of their courses where they have used a resouce along with the option to update any or all of them:

The intention for Commons is for any resources created across the institution for use in the LMS to be centrally housed in a repository for easy sharing. Additionally, the system has the capability for custom groups to be created, allowing commons items to be shared with other users within a faculty, department, or course group. Please contact eClass support for more information for more information or to request the creation of a custom group.

Additional notes:

- Users must be enrolled as Teachers in courses to be able to import from Commons - the functionality does not work for admins.

- It is not possible to import from Commons into courses where the end date has passed.

Note the level of basic course logging where every action a user took in a course was recorded (formerly available in eClass) does not exist in Canvas. Instructors who have queries about student access beyond what is available in new analytics can contact eClass support for escalation of any queries to the vendor.

Basic Access Information

Basic per-user reports can be access through the People page in courses by clicking on a student name and then again on their name in the modal that opens on the right-hand edge of the screen:

The report links are then near the top right:

Important note: the 'Last activity column on the People page is not an accurate metric and should not be trusted, especially for any academic honesty investigations.

Interactions Report: This shows a list of the interactions between an instructor and a particular student. These are accessed the same was as the Student Access Report.

Student Access Report: This shows a summary of student participation in a course.

New Analytics

Canvas New Analytics has five different analytics tabs:

• A. Course Grade - track overall grades by quiz or assignment
• B. Weekly Online Activity - track page views and participation in online activities
• C. Students - sortable statistics of various individual student activities
• D. Reports - generate CSV reports on Missing, Late and Excused Assignments, the Class Roster, and Course Activity
• E. Online Attendance - attendance as a count of page accesses

You can access New Analytics in two ways. You can click the link at the top right of your course home page:

Or click on the New Analytics link in the course left nav menu. If the link is unavailable, add it to the left course navigation tabs by clicking Settings, then the Navigation tab. Drag the New Analytics tab up to the visible tabs area. Note that even though there is no closed eye icon/ beside New Analytics, it will not be visible to your students.

Each analytics tab has its own set of controls:

Filters: Excepting Reports, each tab can be filtered up to three simultaneous items to view the performance of individual students, whole course sections, all enrolled participants in a course, and by assignment or quiz.

Mail: Under the Course Grade, Weekly Online Activity and Students tabs, students can be sent emails based on various criteria, such as grade performance, whether assignments or quizzes are missing, participation, and other criteria.

Report Downloads: Instructors can download data reports in zipped CSV data sets under the Course Grade, Weekly Online Activity, and Students tabs.

Note: Allow up to half an hour for course changes to be reflected in reports.

A. Course Grade

The Course Grade tab can give you both the general performance of your class and the specific performance details of individual students. It can be displayed as a data table or chart. In the chart view, the grade items on the x-axis are displayed as icons. Their values can be seen by hovering over them with your mouse:

The mail option filters recipients according to the selected criteria by score range and whether the assignment is missing or late. You can include a subject line and a message text:

Data can be downloaded in a CSV file containing the column headings, Full name, Sortable name, Canvas user ID, Overall course grade, Assignment on time percent, Last page view time, Last participation time, Last logged out, Email, and SIS ID:

B. Weekly Online Activity

The Weekly Online Activity tab can give you a broader overview of engagement with your course content. It displays a chart and data table summarizing the number of students accessing a resource, the number of views a course page received, and the participation score on each page. The chart can be toggled to a compact data table.

The mail option filters by students who either Viewed, Didn't View, Participated, or Didn't Participate. It can be further filtered by specific course resources and can include a subject line and body text:

Data can be downloaded in two zipped CSV files. The file chart.csv contains the column headings, Week Start, Filter, Students, Avg Page Views, Average Participations, Page views, and Participations:

The file resource.csv provides a higher-level overview of student engagement with course content and contains the column headings Resource, Students, Page views, Participations:

C. Students

The Students tab opens to a data table with a list of all students enrolled in the course and can be sorted by Student, Grade, % On Time, Last Participation, Last Page View, Page views, and Participations.

The mail interface is the same as for Course Grades, with the option to filter by students who either Viewed, Didn't View, Participated, or Didn't Participate.

The file students.csv provides an overview of student engagement with your course content against performance. It lists data under the column headings Full name, Sortable name, Canvas user ID, Overall course grade, Assignment on time percent, Last page view time, Last participation time, Last logged out, Page views, Participations, Email, SIS Id:

D. Reports

The Reports tab allows you to generate five separate reports as CSV files with near real-time data for Missing Assignments, Late Assignments, Excused Assignments, Class Roster, and Course Activity.

Each report link comes with an information bubble when clicked shows column headings for the data reported:

Reports are automatically downloaded to your local computer.

As above, allow up to half an hour for course changes to be reflected in reports. Additionally, the course activity report data only goes back 14 days; data beyond that point can be requested through eClass Support.

E. Online Attendance

The Online Attendance tab generates a simple "attendance" table that shows course page access filtered by week, day, and criteria.

Note: Attendance criteria may be selected in the settings gear icon at the top right of the page and may include

• Course Access (default): Student views a page in the course
• Posts: Student posts a new comment to an announcement or a discussion
• Assignments: Student submits an assignment
• Conferences: Student joins a Big Blue Button conference
• Pages: Student creates a page
• Quizzes: Student starts taking a Classic Quiz or submits a Classic Quiz

The concepts listed here apply equally to adding content to blank courses and can also be viewed in the recording of the August 2024 Canvas Learning Opportunity session Authoring Content. Instructors wanting in-person guidance can sign up for one of the learning opportunities scheduled for August 2025.

(Note if your course contains the custom template but you would like to start fresh with a blank course, it is possible to delete the content or request a blank co-curricular course.)

Selecting the course Home Page

The U of A's custom template contains a polished, visual front page that instructors can use as a course landing page with links to other course areas. The home page is easily edited using the Canvas Rich Content Editor (RCE) and instructors can take advantage of custom graphics created for the U of A.

It is also possible for instructors to use other pages or the Canvas modules view as their course home page but the graphical home page is recommended.

Customizing the Homepage

1. In a course with the U of A template course, click the Edit button near the top right of the Home Page:
2. Start typing over and replacing placeholder areas where indicated by the template - indicated by square brackets.
   
   
3. Click Save at the bottom when done. 

Note: Clicking Home or Pages will return you to the Homepage by default.

Customizing the Home Page Graphics and Navigation elements

The homepage template contains a graphical banner and a 'Course Navigation' section containing four buttons near the bottom that take you to different pages in your course (instructors can follow these links to edit those specific pages in the course.) Instructors can customize the banner graphic and/or these buttons themselves and could also add additional buttons that link to other modules in your course.

Instructions for making changes to the banner images and course card images are provided in the article Using Custom U of A Graphics in Canvas Pages. Instructions for customizing the buttons are contained within the template itself, in the 'Instructor Module' of the course on the page Template: Icons, Banners, & Buttons Customization Options (see screenshot below.)

New in August 2025, instructors and designers looking to rebuild the navigation buttons can now access higher resolution versions of the icon files in google drive.

If you have added custom buttons or are linking to new pages or modules (for example, if you are working on a course migrated through the K16 process), you will need to connect the button to the correct location in your course.

To do this, click on Edit at the top right of your course Home page. Click on the navigation button, then click the Remove link button:

Then click on the button image again so that it takes on a blue border, and click the link icon in the toolbar and select Course link:

In the overlay that opens on the right edge of the screen, search or browse for, then select the page or location in your course to link to:

Then close the overlay and save your changes.

Customizing Other Template Pages

• Customizing the Meet your instructor page

  1. Click Edit 
  2. Add your details in the adjacent spaces
  3. Replace the image with an image of your choice. We recommend images that are similar to the size and orientation of the placeholder image.
     
  4. Image replacement instructions:
     1. Click the image and delete it (with backspace, etc.)
     2. With your cursor still in a place of where the image was, click the uploaded image from the toolbar, which has three options to choose from. By default, the course should have no content so you will choose Upload image
        
     3. Follow the prompts and guides to upload your image and select any preferred settings.
     4. If you have an image from an external public website you prefer to use, you can choose the URL tab and enter the image URL.
     5. If your image needs to be resized, click on your newly uploaded image 'image options'
        
        and choose any of the existing size options to rescale it.
        
  5. Save the changes when complete.

• Syllabus

  • The Syllabus included in the template is a Canvas page that can be modified by clicking Edit  near the top right.
  • If you already have a completed PDF version of your syllabus, you can upload that file into the desired module in your course and/or link that item into the course home page.
  • Note: it is not recommended to use Canvas' built-in Syllabus tool as it has some features that cannot be disabled. There is work progressing on a central syllabus tool that will eventually be integrated into Canvas.
    
    

• Announcements

  • Announcements are not an editable page but a course discussion forum where you can post important news for students. 
  • Announcements in courses open to student access (i.e. within the course participation start and end dates) will automatically send email notifications for every course announcement. Notifications are not sent from closed courses.
  • A sample announcement is available if you need guidance on what a typical announcement may look like. You should delete that sample announcement before publishing the course later (to avoid student confusion). Click on the 3-dots next to them to find options to delete.
    

• Course Q&A

  • This is similar to the Announcements, but students have access to post replies to this area
  • You may click the 3-dots to edit this top-level post and revise/replace as necessary.
  • Note: This is the Q&A Forum linked from the homepage. It should not be repurposed as other forums unless you plan to overhaul the template.

Customizing the Basic Course Left Navigation

Every Canvas course contains a left navigation menu where instructors and students can access the different components of the course and external tools enabled at the course level. These navigation options can be customized per course in the settings, but the U of A template comes with the recommended options enabled.

The navigation options that are enabled by default include People, Modules, Announcements, and Grades. Students and instructors can also access the central external tools Zoom and YuJa through those links. Canvas also provisions some external tools here that only instructors can access: Canvas Studio, New Analytics, Item Banks, and Settings. Since there is some inconsistency in how these links are displayed to students, it is always recommended to confirm the correct links are displayed using the student view.

The options in this list can be changed to meet different course needs - for example if a course will not hold any synchronous meetings over Zoom could be removed or the Library Reading List external tool could be added.

To change the left nav items, click Settings at the bottom of the left nav column, then click on the Navigation tab:

Then drag items to move them into the disabled area or select Disable under the 3 dots menu on the right to remove them from student view:

Note: many external tools are also removed from instructor view so if you are missing tools check under the navigation tab.

Full information about customizing the course navigation menu can be found here.

Customizing other (template) modules

From this point on, you can begin customizing the other modules provided by the template in your course.

Click on Modules on the left-nav to view the structure of the template course.

To add new content to a module, click the + icon near the top right, then select or upload the content to add:

The first module at the top of your course is an instructor-facing module that should not be published to students. It contains a guide to the template, instructions for making customizations to the home page, banner images, and navigation buttons, and links to Canvas guides on course construction:

As you navigate downward in the modules structure, you will see 'Welcome to the Course: Your Journey Begins Here!' that you should already be familiar with from above.

The last three sections available in the template are:

• Template module - A collection of template items and activities that you can model content after. This module can be duplicated for every topic area or week of the course. Note: as there is only one version of a template page, it is best practice to duplicate the module prior to making edits to more easily add content into each section and reuse the template module. Modules can be duplicated from the three-dot menu at the top right of the module header.
• Course conclusion - An example module containing wrap up materials to give students when they've reached the end of the course. If your course is not using automated, sequential release, this module can be unpublished and or removed.
• Need Help? - This is a resource intended for students. It is recommended that you leave this published and unedited, unless you want to make revisions or append to the information. This module could also be linked into the course home page (see above.)

Hiding and Showing Modules

Once built out, modules can be hidden or shown to students by toggling the Publish/Unpublish icons near the top right of each module where you have the option to publish the module itself and/or all of the items it contains. The dropdown also has links to unpublish content to hide it from students:

There is also a link at the top of the Modules page that allows instructors to publish all the modules in the course with 1 click.

For more detailed information on publishing/unblushing activities in Canvas click here.

Please note: there is no need to publish ENTIRE courses. This step is done by default when courses are created through the request system - student access to courses is controlled through the dates set during course creation and which are visible in the course settings at Participation > Course > Dates.

Reviewing Content for Accessibility

After adding content to Canvas courses, instructor's should always thoroughly review what they've added by switching to the student view.

Instructors should also run the Canvas course link checker to validate that there are no problems in their course and can also review the course accessibility checklist (a resource provided by Canvas and reviewed by CTL, OCE, and IST staff for the U of A.) 

Zoom is currently available for all Faculty and Staff at the UofA. If a Zoom account is required by a Staff or Faculty member who does not want to access Zoom via Canvas (or eClass), please contact us at eclass@ualberta.ca to request a manual account in Zoom.

This article describes how instructors can create and launch Zoom meetings through their Canvas course. It is also possible to create online sessions outside of regular Beartracks credit sections.

Adding Zoom to Canvas

1. If Zoom is not visible in your course left navigation menu, you may add it from the Settings menu:

2. Click on the Navigation tab:

3. Click on the three dots to the left of Zoom and drag it up to the area for visible items:

4. Click Save at the bottom of the page. If successful, the Zoom link will be available in the left navigation items visible to students:

Activating a Zoom account

Once you click the link, you should now see the Zoom course dashboard. If this is your first time accessing the tool (and Zoom), you will need to confirm your UAlberta email address as an account on the system. Note: if you already have a Zoom account associated with your UAlberta Gmail account (in the form ccid@ualberta.ca) you may encounter problems with this step. You will need either to delete or rename your personal account to link an account to Zoom through Canvas. 

Clicking the link in your UAlberta email account will allow you to follow a sequence of steps to sign in to and connect your account to Zoom. Note: some people have had their accounts created without needing to go through this step. If you go into the Zoom tool and see the 'Zoom Course meetings' screen, your account is set up.

Now your account is enabled and you will be signed in to the Zoom web application. As this interface is slightly different from the integrated Canvas tool, it is recommended that you navigate back to Canvas and refresh your page.

Setting your Zoom display name

When registering for a Zoom account for the first time using your Bear Tracks information, Zoom will create your account as:

• First name: Preferred first name
• Last name: Primary affirmed last name

If none are set, it will choose your name (in ascending priority):

• legal first and last name (default)
• Primary affirmed name
• Preferred first name

After your account is created, you are free to further customize your profile, including name, etc.

If you already have a Zoom account where you have customized your profile, Bear Tracks will not affect your custom preferences.

Creating Zoom meetings in Canvas:

Now clicking on the Zoom link in the Canvas course sidebar, you should see the Zoom Course recordings interface. This will show any Upcoming meetings you’ve already created, along with tabs for Previous meetings, and any Cloud recordings:

When creating a new meeting, you can specify the following:

• Topic: Enter a name for your meeting to identify it to students
• Description (Optional): Any clarifying information about the meeting needed
• When: The Date and time of the meeting  
• Duration: The meeting length - students will see a Join button in your course until the meeting duration has passed
• Timezone: Leave as the default
• Recurring meeting: can set up a meeting to recur Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or with No Fixed Time  
  • Daily: Set meetings to occur every set number of days
  • Weekly: Set which days of the week to have the meeting and how many weeks to repeat the recurrence
  • Monthly: Set which day of the month to have the meeting and how many months to repeat the recurrence
  • No Fixed Time: The meeting has no set time or duration, it is a meeting you can access any time
  • Note: Meetings can only recur sixty times, so if you need more recurrences than that, you will need to request another meeting.
    
    
• Note: Meetings can only recur sixty times, so if you need more recurrences than that, you will need to request another meeting.
• Registration: Leave unchecked
• Security: You must have one of these options on:
  • Passcode: Enabled by default, this ensures that people can't get into the meeting without the passcode or a direct link to the meeting (such as the "Join" button for students in Canvas).
  • Waiting room: Checking this will require you to click ‘Admit’ for each participant who enters and is recommended for holding virtual office hours.
  • Only authenticated users can join: Use this setting to require students to sign in to their U of A google account before accessing. This ensures that students are logged in to their account, which is recommended for setting up certain settings, such as pre-assigned breakout rooms and watermarks.
• Video: Determine whether video and audio should be enabled by default for Hosts or Participants.
• Audio: Leave as default.
  
  
  
  
• Meeting Options:
  • Enable join before host: If unchecked, students will see a message saying ‘Please wait for the Host to start the meeting’ until you join
  • Mute participants upon entry: Good option to check in large sessions
  • Record the meeting automatically: Check this to record and then specify whether it should be Local (.mp4 stored on your computer) or Cloud (available to students in a list in your course)
  • Alternative hosts: Add instructors and TAs to act as alternative hosts in meetings. Other instructors and TAs in the course who are not added to meeting rooms will not automatically receive notifications about it.
    
    
    
    

Once created, you will see your meeting listed under ‘Upcoming meetings’:

Accessing the meeting settings will provide you with a link to share with external participants. Students in your class can click the link to join.

Getting Started

You must first enable SCORM from your course settings, from the Navigation tab:

Importing and Using SCORM

Once the tool is added, instructors can follow the Canvas documentation to upload SCORM zip files into the SCORM area of their course:

Importing SCORM as an Assignment: https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-import-SCORM-files-as-an-assignment/ta-p/673

Importing SCORM as a Page: https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Instructor-Guide/How-do-I-import-SCORM-files-as-a-page/ta-p/424015

Migrating SCORM from eClass

Courses migrated during the bulk LMS transition via K16 will have their associated SCORM files automatically added to the SCORM area of the course and embedded into the respective modules and/or assignments in Canvas course.

For users performing a regular backup/import from eClass into Canvas, the SCORM files will be created in Canvas but will not be added to the SCORM area or embedded as content. To re-use these SCORM file in the Canvas course:

1. Go to the course's Files area:

2. SCORM files are likely zip files, so you can search for 'zip' and they should appear and you can download them to your computer.

3. Go to the SCORM area of your course and re-upload/import the zip files into the SCORM area (see the linked Canvas guides above).

Grades from SCORM

A graded SCORM assignment completed by a student will send a percent value to the gradebook and factor it out the maximum score (100 by default). If the maximum is changed after scores are received from SCORM, the numerator will not adjust automatically and a student would need to resubmit as there is no way to regrade as a Quiz activity could.

Choosing a binary display value such as Complete/Incomplete will result in any score data above 0 to register as Complete.

SCORM activity results from students are not reviewable by anyone and may only be re-attempted by students, if available in the assignment settings.

There are also some limitations to these workflows that instructors need to be aware of.

Change the start or end dates of a course

A course's start and end dates are set at course creation, but you can hide your course from students by changing its start or end dates.

Note: You may be unable to change your course end date if the term has ended. In this case, contact eClass support for assistance.

Some important caveats apply, but you will not experience any issues if you confine your changes to the start and end dates in the course participation settings.

To change your course dates,

1. Click on Settings at the bottom of the left course navigation menu
2. On the Course details tab, scroll down to the Participation settings
3. Depending on the current progress of your course, change a Start or End date
    that will make the course unavailable

4. Click Update course details at the bottom of the screen

Note: Do not change the Course drop-down menu selection as this change will clear all of the dates in your course.

Publish or unpublish course activities

You can unpublish any course activity by clicking the green checkmark to the right of the assignment name. But there are exceptions:

1. Assignments with student submissions cannot be unpublished.

2. Quizzes with student submissions cannot be unpublished.

In both cases, you will notice that the checkmark has faded. If you click on it or hover your mouse over it, you see a popup message indicating that it cannot be unpublished.

Publish or unpublish a module

If you have hidden your Assignments and Quizzes and attached them to Modules, you can publish or unpublish multiple items by clicking the checkmark or stop sign to the right of the module title:

You can restrict access to a module by switching to the Assign to tab. By default, a module is assigned to Everyone, but you may wish to restrict access to only a subset of enrollees:

Note: You have several options for hiding and unhiding content in a module, but even if you hide the entire module, items with student submissions will not be hidden.

Using requirements to restrict access

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.

1. To specify which items or activities need to be completed before a student can move on, click on the three dots menu to the right of the module name and select Edit:

2. Click on + Requirement:

3. Specify whether all activities must be completed and whether in sequential order or whether a single activity must be completed:  

If you have added your items in the order you want them completed, once students have clicked on the initial page, they can't move on to the next item until they have completed all of the requirements for the first item.

Requirements can include a minimum score on an assignment or quiz.

You keep clicking the +Requirement button until all of the items you want completed are in the list of requirements. You can add pages, quizzes, and assignments in the module.

Each item will have a Next button at the bottom right.

Here is what it would look like in Student View:

All items after the initial page are greyed out until the preceding item is completed.

You can also restrict assignments and quizzes by the number of attempts and all items by date.

Using prerequisites to restrict access to modules

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

1. To specify which module needs to be completed before a student can move on, click on the three dots menu to the right of the module name and select Edit:

2. Click on + Prerequisite:

3. Select the prerequisite module and click Save:

4. When you create a prerequisite in an active course, you have the option of preventing  students from proceeding until they have met the prerequiste by "re-locking" or allowing them to "continue" to proceed without meeting the prerequisite:

Using Mastery Paths to Reinforce Learning

Mastery Paths automatically assigns coursework based on students' performance in previous activities. For example, if a student does not meet the minimum standard in an activity, they can be assigned remedial help before Canvas automatically assigns them to a subsequent lesson. Advanced study is not calculated in the grade total until mastery is achieved.

For full directions, see How do I use Mastery Paths in course modules?

Restricting access to pages

Just as you can with assignments and quizzes, you can restrict access to Canvas pages to specific users and by time and date.

1. To hide a page, go to the Pages menu in the left course navigation menu.

2. Click on the View all pages button on the top left of the menu:

3. Click on the page name in the list of pages.

4. Click the Edit button at the top left of the page.

5. Scroll down to find the Assign Access settings:

6. Click Save at the bottom right of the page.

New for Fall 2025: instructors can use differentiation tags to restrict access to specific pages:

Discussions facilitate student engagement with course content. They can be general discussions, small group discussions, or one-on-one conversations between an instructor and student. The instructor may grade discussions, and they may also be graded as a peer-reviewed activity.

Canvas discussions differ from eClass discussions in 3 major ways:

• All discussions consist of a single topic that the instructor enters when creating the discussion - students then reply to that initial topic and/or to any sub-replies to create threads. There is no option to create multiple top-level topics in a Canvas discussion.
• There is no option to have separate but visible grouped forums.
• There is no option to have force-subscribed discussion forums. 

The Canvas knowledge base has additional instructions on creating discussions.

Adding a discussion

1. To get started, click on Discussions in the left tab menu:

2. In the Discussions page, click the +Discussion button at the top right of the page to create a discussion:

3. The Settings (gear) icon beside the +Discussions button has a set of global settings for all of your course discussions:

4. In My Settings, as an instructor, you may change the setting to mark replies read manually. A new reply has a blue dot. A white dot indicates a reply is read. By default, when you navigate away from the discussion or refresh the page, the blue dots will change to white dots, indicating the replies are read.

For Student Settings, you have options to allow students to

• Create discussion topics
• Create anonymous discussion topics
• Edit and delete their own replies
• Attach files to discussions
• Report replies

Note: Students cannot create anonymous discussion topics unless `Create discussion topics' is active.

Note: If you allow students to create discussion topics, then when you copy content from one course to a new course, then the new course will import the student-created discussion topics.

5. Give your discussion a Topic Title and a clear description of your expectations for the discussion:

Note: the discussion description in the Rich Content Editor (RCE) can include text, URLs, videos, and images.

Restrict a discussion to a course section

You can post a discussion to 'All sections' in your course or set it so that only individual course sections will see it. Note this is only possible in multi-section (combined courses):

Notes:

• Course sections are created for every Bear Tracks cohort added to a course, eg. lectures, labs, etc. Sections help subdivide students within a course and offer section-specific options such as varied due dates for assignments, discussions, and quizzes. There is also a separate section in every course created for Teachers, TAs, Designers, and other administrator roles - this section is prepended with 'Default -' and should not be used for when making posts intended for students.
• Limiting a discussion to a section cannot be used in conjunction with a grouped discussion forum.
• New in Fall 2025, it is now possible to use differentiation tags to limit access to a forum to a subset of users.

Discussion options

1. You may attach a file to the discussion for students to address in the discussion or to add additional information not included in the discussion description:

2. There are three options under Anonymous Discussion:

• Off: student names and profile pictures will be visible to other members of this course
• Partial: students can choose whether to reveal their names and profile pictures
• Full: students post with complete anonymity as student names and profile pictures are hidden

Note: anonymous discussions cannot be graded.

3. Additional options include

• Users must post before seeing replies
• Enable podcast feed
• Graded
• Allow liking
• Add to students' to-do lists

4. Selecting for a Graded discussion adds a grade book column and opens additional settings options:

• Points Possible: You may select the total score
• Display Grade as: points, a percentage, complete/incomplete, letter grade or a GPA scale
• Assignment Group: the discussion will be added to the named assignment group you select in your course

Note: Once an assignment group has been selected, you must go to that group if you need to edit the discussion. For example, if a discussion has been saved to the Assignments group, you can edit it in the Assignments group.

5. In addition, you can assign the graded discussions to course sections or to individual students:

Note: Canvas may, by default, Disallow threaded discussions, which will force participants to respond to the whole discussion rather than to individual posts. Uncheck this option to allow responses to individual posts:

Graded discussions

New in August 2025, in graded discussions it is now possible to set a different amount of points for an initial reply and for subsequent replies to peer's posts by checking Assign graded checkpoints:

Once this is selected, a new area in the discussion settings opens up that allows users to set the Points Possible for the initial Reply to Topic and for the Additional Replies, and the number of Additional Replies Required:

It is also possible to set a different due date and time for the initial reply to the topic and for the additional replies:

When grading a discussion with the checkpoints added, instructors will see separate fields to provide scores for the original Reply to topic and the subsequent Required replies:

Peer-reviewed and group discussions

1. If the option is checked to grade a discussion to Require Peer Reviews, additional options will be available:

2. If assigning the discussion to groups, choosing `This is a Group Discussion' lets you assign to a Group Set or groups created in your course:

3. Students can also be allowed to "like" posts or liking can be restricted to graders:

When working in grouped discussions, Instructors need to select a specific group to interact with under the Group Discussion button near the top right. 

There is NO option to view the posts and replies from all the assigned group at once.

Due dates and availability

Finally, set the due dates and availability dates for Graded Discussions:

If you are assigning due dates and availability to multiple different sections or individuals, click +Add to add them.

AI Discussion Summaries (Feature Preview)

New in September 2024, instructors can now use an AI-driven feature that summarizes all the posts in a particular forum. This has been released as a 'feature preview' by Canvas and must be enabled at a course level by instructors to opt-in. Summaries can only be viewed by instructors and TAs and may be regenerated and or guided with prompts to explore specific topics.

To enable discussion summaries, open the course Settings, access the Feature options tab, and click Enabled for Discussion summary:

With this enabled, to generate a summary of a discussion, click the Summarize button at the top of the discussion:

Full Canvas documentation on this feature is available here. 

Canvas has a toggle at the top of course pages, labeled "View as Student". This functions similarly to creating a Demostudent in your eClass course.

To enter the student view, click the button at the top right of the screen:

This will create a purple border around the screen to indicate that you are in the student view, as well as a banner with Reset Student/Leave Student View controls. The Reset Student button will clear any submissions by the test student and remove any grades from the gradebook. It will not completely remove the test student from the gradebook, however.

Some notes about using the student view in Canvas:

• Similar to the eClass demostudent, using the student view will create a row in the course gradebook (which will always appear at the end of the list of students). To remove this completely, you'll need to unenroll the test student by going to your course settings>>Sections>>coursename and clicking the 'x' that appears when you hover your cursor over the test student:
  
  
  
• The test student is associated with the course rather than an individual user- unlike eClass, where an instructor's demostudent account is a unique profile associated with the instructor's account. This means that any instructor in the course will see the test student's uploaded assignments, grades, etc. If another instructor enters student view, they will be using the same profile. Each course has its own separate test student account.
  
  
• Posts by the test student in discussions (or other activities where students interact with each other) will be visible to actual students in the course, and will persist even if the test student is removed from the course. So it may be best to test discussion features in a sandbox course instead.

Limitations

• New Quizzes (the recommended quiz type for general use) should not be used with the student view, as attempts cannot be reset and will affect analysis reports. To test quizzes, use the Preview button on the Build page:
  
  
  
• Differentiated assignments (assignments with different due dates or availability dates for individuals) cannot be assigned to the test student. This applies to assignments that are set to open at different times for different sections in a course.
  
  
• Collaborations, external apps, groups, and peer reviews also will not work with the test student.

There are a number of different use cases or workflows listed below the the tool can perform but note that none of these are required if instructors simply want to do a bulk grade-only upload into the gradebook from a csv file as the standard Canvas grade import workflow can do that.
 

Preparing Comments for Upload

The Bulk Feedback Upload Tool requires a .csv file that contains the student identifier and the comments. An example of the file can be downloaded here or it can be obtained from within the Bulk Upload tool itself (once launched in a course, see below):

The .csv file for upload must contain one column identifying the students and one column containing their associated text comments; Additionally an optional column for grades can also be included. The column header names can be anything but there are only 3 options to identify students (map to) in Canvas:

- Canvas ID: The Canvas user account id, available from a Canvas gradebook export in the column titled 'ID'; or

- Student ID Number: available from a Bear Tracks course roster export or from a Canvas gradebook export in the column titled 'SIS User ID'; or

- CCID: (recommended) The CCID, available from a Bear Tracks course roster export or a Canvas gradebook export in the column titled SIS Login ID.

The downloadable .csv file (linked above) contains ALL these columns as examples so instructors will need to delete any columns that they are not using:

The final prepared file should look like this and then be saved as a csv for upload:

Using Other Spreadsheet types: It is also possible for instructors to create their .csv file by exporting their class roster from Bear Tracks, Canvas, or elsewhere. The example below shows a Canvas gradebook export being prepared to bulk import comments:

Instructors using Canvas gradebook exports should delete the 'Points Possible' row and the 'Student, Test' rows (if your gradebook export contains it). Then student comments can be added to the appropriate column. Instructors can leave the student 'Name' column in place while adding comments just to keep it organized: 

Use Case 1: Creating a New Grade Item (Assignment) and Uploading Comments

This workflow would be used if instructors needed to upload text or numeric data that is mapped to specific students using their CCID or student ID number. Examples might be text-based feedback from an in-person presentation, a randomly generated number for each student for participation in a research study, or their assigned seating number for a large in-person exams.

To bulk upload comments:

1. To create a new grade item, create an assignment in a module or in the Assignments area of your course: 

2. Give it a title and set the submission type to External tool:

3. Then click Find, locate the Bulk Grade-Feedback Upload Tool, then click Select:

4. The rest of the assignment settings can be left at the default values so scroll to the bottom of the page then click Save & Publish:

Important note: bulk uploads will not work in Canvas unless the assignment is published so instructors should warn students that they may receive notifications about the comments upload assignment being created (even if they have hidden the associated gradebook column.)

5. Once the csv file is prepared (see above), open the assignment you have just created which will open the Bulk Feedback-Grade Upload Tool interface:

6. Next click the paper clip icon or anywhere in the Select CSV File area to locate and select the prepared csv file:

7. Once the file name appears in the selection box, click Next:

8. Any issues with the file will be identified at this stage but if the file is formatted correctly users will now have the option to map their csv columns to Canvas. First select the name of the csv column that identifies the students; then select the corresponding identifier from Canvas; then identify the column containing comments; and finally click CONTINUE:

The page will display the identified mappings - if correct click UPLOAD NOW:

A progress indicator will appear:

9. Any mapping issues will be identified and if the file is formatted correctly, the comments will be uploaded:

10. Students will be able to see their comments through the gradebook. Note: if the gradebook column has an automatic grade posting policy, students will immediately receive a notification of this grading event so instructors should confirm their grade posting policy first.

Use Case 2: Uploading Comments AND Grades into a New Grade Item

It is also possible for instructors to upload both grades AND comments from an existing file into Canvas in this same workflow. A common use case for doing this would be for exams administered through TSQS which produces a single spreadsheet containing one column with grades and other columns with the scored responses or wrong answers.

To do this, instructors need to follow almost the exact steps as for Use Case 1 shown above with 2 differences:

1. The prepared csv file must contain a column titled that contains the students scores in numeric format. An example file showing this looks like:

2. Once the file has been uploaded, then instructors need to check the box Upload Grades (Optional), identify the column containing grades in the csv file in the 'Select Grade column', and then click CONTINUE:

Review the selections from the csv file and click UPLOAD NOW:

3. Students will now see the uploaded scores and the comments in their view of the gradebook:

Use Case 3: Uploading Only Comments into an Existing Grade Item

Using a different workflow, instructors can also bulk add comments to existing, grade items in Canvas. A potential use case might be to add additional text-based feedback on long form exams already graded in Canvas. This process is the same in terms of constructing the csv file but the upload is launched in a different way:

1. Access the settings area of the course and at the top right of the 'Course Details' tab, click Bulk Feedback Upload Tool:

2. This will open the bulk upload interface with the same interface to select the csv file:

3. Once a valid csv file has been uploaded, instructors will have the same view to map the column headers from their csv to canvas and optionally upload grades as well:

After clicking CONTINUE, there will be an additional dropdown to select the existing grade column:

4. Once selecting the existing column, a review screen will show the options selected and if everything looks good, instructors can click UPLOAD NOW and students will then see their new comments (and grades if using.)

Use Case 4: Bulk Uploading Multiple Comments into a report for students

If instructors have a number of comments that they want to give to students, they can structure these as separate columns in the csv and the bulk upload tool will parse these into a formatted file for student review. An example of this use case would be if a grading tool produced different feedback values for a series of criteria like a rubric.

A csv file constructed this way might look like this:

Instructors should set the student identifier column mappings and then below the comments dropdown, check beside Check here to upload multiple columns of comments. This will update the form to accept multiple columns from the csv:

Once those are entered, click CONTINUE then UPLOAD NOW after validating the mappings.

Students will now see an html file in their comments area for this assignment once a grade column is posted. Files can only be accessed through the student's gradebook view:

Viewing Bulk Uploaded Comments

1. In your gradebook in the grade column where comments were uploaded, click on an active cell to reveal more interface functions.

2. Click on the icon showing an arrow in a box.

3. The quick grading panel will slide in from the right edge of your brpowser and the uploaded comments will be visible at the bottom under the 'Bulk Feedback Uploader' user account:

Known Issues/Usage notes

• Assignments MUST be published or the tool cannot function. If you encounter the error message 'Bulk upload failed, user not authorized to perform that action', this is the likely cause. Instructors who wish to review comments and/or grades before releasing them need to switch the course grade posting policy to 'Manual' and then post the grades after review.
• If the course grade posting policy is set to automatic, or the column visibility has been set to show, students will see email notifications when comments are uploaded by the tool. 
• When reviewing their comments, students and instructors will see Bulk Feedback Uploader as the author of the comment, not the instructor's name.
• It is possible to re-upload new comments into the same grade item but these will be appended as additional comments. It is not possible to delete the previous comments but instructors are able to delete the entire assignment if this is desired. This must occur from the Assignments page, not from within the gradebook.
• When uploading grades and comments, it is possible to upload letter grade scores for students but this requires that the assignment setting 'Display Grade as' set to Letter Grade:
  
  
• When adding multiple comments as an html file, instructors will not see the full file if accessing through a cell in the gradebook - only the text 'Please see attached files.' It is only possible to see the files through the student gradebook view.
• Some Firefox users encounter errors when selecting valid csv files. Workaround: switch to Chrome to upload the csv.

Canvas Teacher is available for both Android and iOS devices.

Important Note

While the Canvas Teacher app can be used for the functionality mentioned above — grading, communication, and performing updates — it is NOT recommended for creating any content in the course. While you can update an assignment's due date or a discussion forum's description, it can't be used to create new assignments or other course content. 

We recommend accessing Canvas on a desktop or laptop computer to create course content. 

Downloading the App

To access the Canvas Teacher app:

App Features

When you first log into the Canvas Teacher app, you will arrive at the course Dashboard. Like the desktop version, You can switch to a list view. You can give your courses nicknames and change the icon colours:

From the All Courses link, you can show or hide current courses. Click to fill in a star to show courses, or click to empty the star to hide courses:

If you tap on a course, you can view many of the course navigation tabs available in the desktop course:

If you click on the left arrow at the top left of a course page, you can return to the Dashboard and the controls at the bottom of the page for your Calendar, To-Do list, and course Inbox.

Tap on any date to view Calendar items for that date. You can open any item listed in the Calendar by tapping it:

If you tap on the To Do list, you can open any item listed by tapping it:

The Canvas Inbox is an email messaging system built into Canvas. In the two Inbox dropdowns, you can filter on the course for which you want to see messages and also filter messages by Inbox, Unread, Starred, Sent, and Archived:

You can access additional course from the dropdown menu at the top left of the dashboard:

The menu has links to course Files, your Canvas Studio Library, app Settings, and others:

The Files menu includes all of the files you have uploaded to the course, including files added to quizzes, assignments, and discussions:

The Canvas Studio link opens a browser link directly to your Studio library. You can create Studio items by webcam capture, uploading from your device, or adding an external ink. You can search for library items and filter by date, collections, and various media types:

Under Settings, you can change your app theme, edit your profile, and choose how you are notified:

Grading in the Instructor App

You can grade course items in the app interface, but it may be easier to use the desktop site instead.

To grade an item, open the course and tap on the assignment, quiz, or discussion you wish to grade. Tap on the item "Need Grading":

If the item to be graded is a New Quiz, you may need to choose to open an external tool.

Tap on the name of the student whose quiz needs grading, and scroll to the questions that need grading:

Enter the mark for each question and add comments via the word balloon:

This article provides an overview of the communication tools available for instructors within Canvas. The Canvas Learning Opportunities delivered in August 2024 also covered the topic Communicating with Students.

Inbox

The Canvas Inbox how users can communicate with each other, e.g. with individuals, TA's, to multiple users like for a whole class.

You can access it from the Inbox icon from the left nav:

The two panes below can be seen if the Course and Inbox dropdown filters have any messages. Selecting one from the left will show replies to it on the right:

The Inbox lets you send messages filtered by course and by the type of participant in your course:

You can also send messages to individual users. Here, you may reply, delete, or archive messages:

You can filter by several views of your Inbox, including Sent and Unread items:

You may communicate directly with individuals by clicking on their name in the People tab, and then clicking on the envelope icon:

Notes:

• Notifications are not sent to users in unpublished courses; messages will become visible to students after the course opens, but no alert will send.
• You cannot send messages to yourself. If you are the only one enrolled in a course and send a test message to the course, nothing will happen.

For more information, see Inbox in the Canvas Community Knowledge Base.

Announcements

This may be used to communicate important, course-related information to your whole class.

Navigate to Announcements...

...and create a post by and clicking on +Announcement.

Setting up Announcements is similar to Discussions with the main difference being a toggle to allow users to comment in the former:

By default, instructors should ensure that they select 'All sections' in the 'Post to' selector to ensure that students are receiving notifications. If an announcement is meant to go only to a specific sub-section, it is critical that that section is correctly selected (choosing the 'Default' course section will only send notifications to the instructors and TAs in a course).

For more information, see Announcements in the Canvas Community Knowledge Base.

Notes:

- Notifications will not be sent retroactively for announcements created before publishing your course or before the course start date. You may consider using the Delay Posting option and set to publish on a future date.

- The 'Forced subscription' option available in eClass does not exist in Canvas so it is possible for students to disable notifications from course announcement forums. Best practice is to communicate in-class with students the expectation that course announcement forums should not be disabled.

- Students can reply to Announcement messages so it may be worth appending a canned message like "Replies to this email will be posted as a reply to the announcement, which will be seen by everyone in the course" to advise them of this. 

- Announcements are copied forward during course creation if past courses used them.

- Announcement posts can be deleted by selecting them and then clicking the trash can icon near the top right:

Discussions

For more information regarding this topic, please see the following articles:

• Adding Discussions in Canvas
• Discussions in the Canvas Community Knowledge Base

Collaborations

Connect your Google Drive suite (Docs, Sheet, Slides, Assignments, etc) to Canvas by setting this up. This will allow you to share Drive content of your choosing in Canvas, which may allow for live collaborative work in the Google suite. Privacy and sharing options are available for you to customize to control the visibility and capabilities of collaborators.

For more information, see:

• What are Collaborations?
  • Google Docs
  • Google Drive files
  • Google Assignments

Click Collaborations in your course on the left navigation to get started:

If your screen shows the stricken-eyeball icon, you will need to enable it from your course Settings (Navigation tab).

Creating items in Collaborations generates a Canvas link that navigates to your desired Google document.

Sending emails to students

Instructors can email all students in a course outside of Canvas either by obtaining a list of student emails from Bear Tracks or from their course.

To obtain emails from Canvas, go to the Course Analytics link in the left navigation menu (or the button on your course home page). Click the Students tab and then click the down-pointing arrow to download a CSV list of the students, including sortable columns for their names and their email addresses:

The resulting csv file will contain a column of email addresses that can be pasted into a mail program.

Whenever an instructor creates a quiz, assignment, or discussion in Canvas, it is automatically linked as an activity in the Assignments tab.

Assignments can be added to assignment groups first by creating groups using the +Group link in Canvas:

Assignments can be moved into groups by clicking and dragging the eight dots to the left of an assignment name, or by clicking the three dots to the right of the assignment name and selecting a location to move to:

Once you have created assignment groups and added assignments to them, you start to weight the assignment groups.' 

To get started with weighting grades by Assignment groups, click on the three dots beside +Assignment, then click Assignment Groups Weight:

canvas_weight_assignment_start.png

Assignment groups can be weighted by percentage. Percentages should add up to 100. Click the checkbox beside "Weight final grade based on assignment groups" and the list of assignment groups becomes available:

Once you have set up the weights, each assignment group will display the group weight at the top left of the group:

Note: Once assignment groups have been weighted, grades will display for students and instructors as both individual grades and by the weight of each assignment group.

 For details on how assignment group weighted grades are calculated, see How do I weight the final course grade based on assignment groups?