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How to quickly set up your Canvas-page for online teaching

Because of the Covid-19 all teaching has been transformed to online teaching. In this guide, you

will find the most important tips for setting up your course in Canvas and information on how

to communicate with students, share materials and start activities.

Communication with students

First of all, you need to inform your students that you are teaching them online from now on.

You can use announcements in Canvas to write a message for all students in your course. The

announcement will remain in your canvas page for students to read. The students will get a

notification about your announcement in an email and in their Canvas app on their

smartphone, if they have downloaded the app.

1. Select announcement in the left menu in your Canvas course.

2. Click on “+ Announcement” to start a new announcement.

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3. Write your message in the text field

4. Remember to save the announcements.

Send a message to students from the inbox in Canvas

In addition to announcement in Canvas you can also send messages from the “inbox” in the left

menu. Students will get a notification on email or on their smartphone in the Canvas app, if

they have downloaded the app. Click on the “inbox” icon in the left menu.

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1. In the inbox you can compose a new message.

2. Select the course, write the message and remember to click on “send”.

Structure your Canvas course

Now you need to think about how you can help students to navigate in the information you

provide to them. Remember that students are sitting at home and do not have you or other

peers to ask, so it is very important that you create a good structure in Canvas. Keep in mind

that students can not see what your intentions and plans are, so you need to write it down or

use video to tell them. For this, you can use “pages” in Canvas. In “pages” it is possible for you

to write instructions, add links to files, add video etc.

To add a page in a module, use the “+” ikon and add a new page.

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In the picture below you see one example of how you can structure your course in Canvas with

pages. Maybe you want to structure your course in a different way.

In a page you can write information for students. You can also add link to files, embed Youtube

videos, Panopto videos etc.

When you click on “edit” the editor will open and you can start editing the page.

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Adding your Panopto video to your course

In Canvas you can share your Panopto video with a link. This way it makes it easy for students

to navigate in the video.

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Using chats to answer questions from students

In a course you can activate the chat function for a quickly way to answer questions from

students. The chat requires all of you to be online at the same time.

To start the chat function:

1. Click on “settings” in the canvas course left menu

2. Click on the “navigation” tab in the top

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3. Find chat and click on the icon with the three dots. Then “Enable” appears

4. Click on “Enable” and remember to click on Save. The chat appears to students in the

left menu.

5. Now add the chat to the course in a module. Use the “+” icon in the module

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6. Click on “external URL”. Select “Chat” from the list.

7. Click on “add item”.

8. The chat appears in the module.

OBS! Remember to inform students which exact time and date you will be ready to chat

with them. You can use a page in a module or you can write an announcement.

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Using discussions to answer questions from students and to create a dialogue

For communication with students, you can use “discussions” in Canvas. Discussions can be used

for dialogue or questions to your video lecture and the readings or other learning materials you

have. In a discussion, all students will be able to see all posts. Imagine it as similar to a

classroom, where all students can hear what other students say. The main advantage is that it is

easier for students to recap on the dialogue because they can go back and read it.

1. Use the “+” icon to start a discussion in a module

2. Select “discussion” from the list

3. Click on “new discussion” and give it a title which reflects the content E.g. “discussion

for week X about XX” or “discussion about video lecture 1”.

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4. The discussion appears in the module

5. Now click on “edit” in the discussion to write the first introduction message.

6. Write your message. Now students are well informed about what to do and they can

take part in the discussions by clicking “reply” to your message.

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7. Remember to scroll down and click on “allow threaded replies” and then save.

Start with a “soft question” for students to discuss

We recommend that you start with one discussion with a “soft” question to discuss in order to

let students feel safe about writing in discussions. Often students can feel shy about posting in

discussions because their writings are remained through the course. In the classroom, people

cannot remember precisely what you said for five minutes ago and this makes it more safe for

us to speak up. If you have large classes, we recommend that you create groups and tell

students to organize with a group leader, who will post messages on behalf of the group in the

discussion. Otherwise, there will be too many messages to read for you and your students.

Discussion for groups

You can either set up a Canvas discussion for the whole class or for a group of students. If you

have a large class and every student write a post in a discussion it will become a huge amount

of posts to read and this can lead to an information overload. Try instead to divide your

questions into more discussions or use discussions in groups.

Give the discussion a title, which reflects the content in the discussion. To provide students

with a quick overview.

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If you have created groups in Canvas you can use these groups for discussion.

This can be set up when you start a discussion.

Moderating discussions

We recommend that you visit the discussion on and off to read/go through the messages. This

is to prevent that misunderstandings are spreading (to become “fake news”), but also to show

students your attendance. Students cannot see that you are reading/going through their posts.

The only way you can show them is to post a short message in the discussion, E.g. you can

write: “very nice to see how engaged you are” or “I’m happy to see that you study hard” or

“Please don’t feel afraid of writing here. “Write if you have questions or if I can help you” etc.

Anything you write will motivate them to become more active.

Make a final summary

After finishing the discussion, we recommend that you write a short summary/conclusion to say

that the discussion has finished and that you will not be moderating it any longer.

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Set up an assignment

In Canvas you can set up an assignment for students to hand-in.

1. In a module you must use the “+” icon to add assignment.

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2. Click on “new assignment”.

3. Remember to click on “add item”.

Go to the Canvas training course to see more about setting up the assignment in details or

search the Canvas guides for “help” in the Canvas left menu.

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Insert a quiz

In Canvas you can set up a quiz for students to hand-in.

1. In a module you must use the “+” icon to add assignment.

2. Click on “quiz”

3. Click on “new assignment”.

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4. Give a title and remember to click on “add item”.

5. Click on “edit” to start adding questions in the quiz.

Go to the Canvas training course to see more about setting up the assignment in details or

search the Canvas guides from “help” in the Canvas left menu.