Author: Karen Turpin

Canvas start of the semester instructor checklist

Create or Import your Content

Multiple ways to begin to build your class

Copy from another class in Canvas. Your access to classes you have previously taught in Canvas continues indefinitely.

Copy in an entire course or portions of one from Canvas Commons.

Create your content from scratch in Canvas

Review Assignments, Quizzes, and Discussions

  • Verify activities and content in the course are published.
  • Verify dates. Due dates are added to the calendar and the syllabus and serve as reminders to students. “Available from” and “Until” dates will unlock and lock the activity.
  • Verify instructions are accurate and well formatted.
  • Verify assignment submission types.
  • Verify number of quiz attempts is correct.
  • Verify assignment groups are set up correctly. See: How to use Assignment Index Page.
  • Verify assignments are weighted correctly, if using a weighted grading system. See: How to Weight Assignment Groups.
  • Verify discussions are ordered logically on Discussions list page.
  • Verify Quiz “Options” are correct. See: Canvas Quiz Options.

Review Course Details

Final Preparations

  •  Publish your course when you are ready for students to have access to it. This typically is on the morning of or before the official course start date. See: How do I publish a course? NOTE: Some faculty like to publish their courses well in advance of the start date, but only publish a handful of elements of the course (such as the syllabus). This allows enrolled students to “preview” the class.
  • For online and hybrid classes, encourage students to attend a Student Online Academic Readiness (SOAR) workshop. You may also wish to share the Canvas Student Orientation to help any students who are new to Canvas to have a resource for learning the basics.
  •  Especially for online and hybrid classes, send an email to your students through your SURF Roster telling them how to access your course in Canvas.

Cautions

  • Canvas email (Inbox/Conversation) messages will not be sent out if the course is unpublished. Send class messages from your SURF Roster instead, prior to publishing the course.
  • Pay attention to the time stamp on anything you have placed a date on. 12:00 means the very first minute of the selected day. For end dates, it is often best to choose 11:59 PM to ensure you are setting it up on the correct date.

An Option for Sending Out Midsemester Reports

Hi Folks,

Each semester I send out “midsemester grades” to all of my students.  Students appreciate the heads up, and it often leads to conversations that benefit the students.

For those interested in sending out a “midterm report” regarding your students’ current grade in the course…   consider using the message option in the “New Analytics” feature.  With it, you can customize messages to go out to students based on their grade percentage (e.g., between 90% – 100%, 80% – 89%, 70% – 79%, 60% – 69%, etc.).  This is an excellent way to let students know how they are currently doing in the course.

First Step: Grading and the Canvas Gradebook

  • Complete all grading 24 hours before sending out the midterm reports.  The ‘New Analytics’ feature does not read directly from the gradebook… it has a lag of 24 hours before it is updated.  Once you have finished grading… wait 24 hours before sending out the midterm reports.
  • As part of the grading, place a zero for any assignments overdue that are not submitted (otherwise, they are not included in the grade calculations)

Second Step: Enable the New Analytics Feature

  1. Click on the ‘Settings’ option in your Canvas Course
  2. Click on the ‘Features Options’ tab along the top
  3. Click the ‘New Course and User Analytics’ option
Screen shot for Step 1, 2 and 3.

Third Step: Open the New Analytics Feature

  • From the Home Page of your Canvas course, select ‘New Analytics’
New Analytics button

Fourth Step: Prepare to Send Out Messages

  • Click on the ‘Envelop’ icon.
Envelope Icon

Fifth Step: Prepare to Send Out Messages

  • Provide the lower and upper range for grade percentage.
  • Type the Subject line and Message.  Adjust both to be meaningful and helpful to the students receiving the message.  I tend to say ‘Congratulations’ for all passing grades (A, B, and C), and let students with grades not quite passing that making a change now could help them to pass the course.  For students significantly below passing, I share that a bigger ‘mid-course’ correction is needed, but that it remains within their options.  Share resources, provide advice, and cheer them on.
  • Click ‘Send’
  • Repeat this process for each grade range you’ll be using (e.g., 90 – 100, 80 – 89, 70 – 79, 60 – 69, etc.).
Settings screen for Message Students Who.

Sincerely,

Robert

█ Robert G. Kelley, Ph.D.
█ Psychology Department
█ MiraCosta College

Dropped Students in Canvas – People Roster

Students that drop a course in SURF after the semester has started remain on the People roster in Canvas, but with an inactive role. Students in the inactive role do not see or have access to the Canvas course, but faculty may access activities and grades of an inactive student. This is particularly helpful when a student grade is challenged or if a faculty member is evaluating whether a dropped student is eligible to be reinstated to a course.

People

Within the People roster on Canvas, students that have dropped will have the inactive tag displayed to the right of their name. This identifier will remain next to the student’s name throughout the course unless the student is reinstated to the course. Click the student’s name to access additional information about the student and review the student’s completed activities.

  • You cannot hide inactive students in the People roster.

Grades

Inactive students are hidden by default in the gradebook. To view the grades of inactive students, choose Show Inactive Enrollments in the Gradebook settings. For complete details, see: How do I view grades for inactive student enrollments in the Gradebook?

Filtering Canvas Grades to Only Show SURF Enrolled Students

By default the Grades tool will display all users in the roles Student, Sample Student, Tutor, Evaluator, STEM Tutor, and WC SI Leader in your Canvas course. This can make grading difficult as the additional roles will mix in alphabetically with your SURF Enrolled students.

For ease of grading, you can filter your gradebook by section to only display SURF enrolled students.

From within Canvas:

  1. Click on Grades
Step 1 Grades Filter
  1. Click the Apply Filters button
  2. Click Sections
Step 2 Click Apply Filters button and Step 3 Click Sections
  1. Select the section number that ends in -SURF
Step 4: Select the section number that ends in -SURF

To display only users in the -OTHER roles 

  1. Select the section number that ends in -OTHER to view only non-SURF enrollment types.
The -other section selection.

To display all users together in the Gradebook

  1. Select the Clear All Filters link on the right side of the Gradebook to view all enrollment types.
Clear All Filters

Custom Filters in Gradebook

It is possible to build a gradebook filter in Canvas that is just right for your grading needs. These custom gradebook filters can be used once or saved for future use.

Course Evaluations in Canvas

Course evaluations are integrated within Canvas for both faculty and students. MiraCosta uses EvaluationKIT to provide this function. When you have a course section that is part of your evaluation process, this page has information to help you ensure it goes smoothly.

Information to share with your students

These directions are for the SURF enrolled students within your course.

Students can access the course evaluation within Canvas, or through an email sent to them from MiraCosta’s course evaluation survey administrator. Provide the link below to your students to help them with the evaluation process in Canvas.

Students must have cookies and pop ups enabled within their browser for the course evaluation tool to work correctly.

Advise students to contact the Student Help Desk if they need assistance with course evaluations. The phone # is (760)-795-6655.

*Note for Instructors: The Student Course Evaluations menu item will NOT work with your Faculty Canvas Sample Student account, or the Instructor’s Student View in Canvas, as those accounts are not SURF enrolled users within your course.

Information for Faculty

As an instructor, you can view your course evaluation surveys from the course navigation menu or from the To Do list within your course. It is important to have the EvaluationKIT Course menu navigation tool available in Canvas in order to show the ‘Instructor Course Evaluations’ navigation menu item. Even if this tool is available in Settings > Navigation, this tool will only show up in your course if there is a course survey associated with your course.

If you modified your course navigation menu, you may have hidden the EvaluationKIT Course menu navigation tool. If you are being evaluated, you must enable the EvaluationKIT Course menu navigation tool so that you will see the navigation menu item ‘Instructor Course Evaluations‘, and your students will see the ‘Student Course Evaluations‘ navigation menu item.

Instructor Navigation Menu

If you have not made any changes to your course navigation menu, this is the default location for the EvaluationKIT course surveys. Remember, this tool will only display if you have a course survey associated with your course. The navigation menu item is displayed as ‘Instructor Course Evaluations‘ in the instructor view.

Default location of Instructor Course Evaluations in the Canvas course navigation menu This tool will only display if you have a course survey associated with your course.

Instructor To Do List

On the To Do list within a Canvas course, you can also view your course evaluation survey. In this area you can view the percentage of students who have responded, as well as the start and end date of your course evaluation survey.

NOTE: Courses with a 1/1/3000 date on the Course Evaluation Survey are NOT being evaluated in the current semester.

Course evaluation surveys are located here on the Canvas course To Do list with % responded and start and end dates. NOTE: Courses with the 1/1/3000 date are NOT being surveyed this semester.

Enabling the EvaluationKIT Course Navigation Menu Tool

If you edited your Canvas course navigation menu, and your course is being evaluated, you may need to add the EvaluationKIT Course navigation tool back to your Canvas course. This is necessary so that you and your students will be able to access your course evaluations in the Canvas course navigation menu.

  1. Click on Settings. You will find this as the last option on your course navigation menu.
  2. Click the Navigation tab.
  3. Find the EvaluationKIT Course option in the bottom list of hidden navigation items.
  4. Drag EvaluationKIT Course from the bottom list to the top list of available items.
  5. Click the Save button
Steps 1-4
Step 5

Questions about Course Evaluations

For questions about student surveys and/or the Course Evaluations & Surveys system, associate faculty should contact their school’s Academic Division Administrative Assistant. Full-time faculty should contact human resources at evalsupport@miracosta.edu

If you are having a computer specific issue with a MCC computer contact the campus Employee Help Desk at (760) 795-6850.

1 2 3 4 5 6 … 24