Managing Your Canvas Site

Before getting started in Canvas, be sure to update your personal settings. It’s an important step to make sure you stay connected with your classes. You’ll need to do this only once, unless your preferences change.

The following list outlines the main settings you should consider reviewing and are linked to detailed guides:

Copy a course when you want to use or repurpose previously created content — including course settings, syllabus, assignments, modules, files, pages, discussions, quizzes, and question banks. You can also copy or adjust events and due dates. Not all content can be copied as part of a course. (Learn about “Import Limitations.”) Canvas lets you copy all content from one course site to another or select specific content.

Course shells for each new term will be available in the preceding term. For example, winter course shells will be available midway through the preceding fall term. If you need a place to work on your course sooner or just want a sandbox where you can test new ideas, create a new Canvas course shell from your Canvas Dashboard. 

It’s always a good idea to check your course from the student’s perspective. This helps you identify what elements a student can access and how the course navigation menu displays for them.

To enter Student View, select “Settings” in the course navigation menu. Next, select “Student View” from among the settings area’s options.

Student View has a highlighted frame or border.

You can navigate the course as a student, with some slight exceptions:

• Groups: As an instructor in Student View, all group information will be available to you, while students will only have access to their own group. 
• Inbox: The Test Student doesn’t have a Canvas Inbox, so you won’t be able to test communications.
• Other tools: Some other tools (e.g., Panopto, VoiceThread, etc.) may not function as expected.

To exit Student View, select the “Leave Student View” button.

You can check all external links throughout your course with the course link validator. It finds invalid or unresponsive external links in both published and unpublished content. However, some links it flags as unresponsive (to Canvas servers) will still work for students.

These settings are available only to the course instructor:

• Set a course image: This allows you to change the dashboard image associated with your course.
• Enable a grading scheme: This gives students a letter grade for assignments and the overall course.
• Allow students to attach files to discussions: This allows students to include files and images on discussion boards.
• View course analytics/statistics: This offers insight into student engagement in your course.
• Publish your course: This makes your course visible to students. You must “publish” your course for students to have access.
  • Important note: Each item in your course needs to be published for students to access it. This includes all pages and links in your modules as well as assignments, quizzes, and discussions.
• Display announcements on the course home page: This allows you to show announcements on your course home page, so students notice them upon entering. You control how many announcements to display.