My current institution is just starting the move to Canvas LMS (yay!) and I’m part of the team working on helping instructors prepare for the transition. Despite knowing this was coming for over a year, it still feels like a train barreling down the tracks towards us at a very fast rate. Fall 2024 will be here before we know it…and while I have several years of teaching with Canvas under my belt - and experienced the transition-to-Canvas roller coaster at my prior institution - it’s been, as the kids say, a hot minute since I was using Canvas on the daily. Although a significant number of my Tech Thursday posts are dedicated to Canvas (see the Canvas Round-Up below), I would love to get ideas for what new features or functions are making your life, or at least your teaching and grading life, easier.
If you have experience using Canvas, I would love to get your thoughts on 3 short questions - this will help me better understand how instructors use Canvas day-to-day, both what you love and what you hate.
Things I don’t love about Canvas
As I have had access to Canvas again for about four weeks now, there are some things I remember having trouble with that don’t seem to be any better now.
Discussion forums. These were pretty awful in Blackboard, but somehow, they are even worse in Canvas - both from the student side and the instructor side. Is a third party tool like Perusall or Harmonize just the way to go? Both are pretty powerful tools, so I’m not sad about just making the blanket recommendation.
Grading quizzes in the app. Really, just one thing - not being able to grade by question in the app the way you can in the web version. I get that the whole point of the app is a more streamlined experience for mobile use…I guess I just want it to be more like the web version?
Classic vs. New Quizzes. Why do two versions still exist, five plus years after debuting New Quizzes? Why can’t there be one quiz tool that does all of what we like about both tools, combined? As I remember, the Classic Quizzes pretty much just had (1) better item analysis, and (2) the anonymous survey option. It seems like the New Quizzes offer more item analysis options now, so…why do Classic Quizzes still exist? (Serious question - let me know if you know what I’m overlooking!)
Things that are *almost* great
Canvas Chat. It is a neat feature, but I wish it was a little more like Microsoft Teams chat (channels, easy linking of sites/files, tagging of individuals, groups, or the whole class). If you’ve never used it, there’s definitely situations where it’s a helpful tool.
Teacher App. I think students love the student version of the app, which is lucky since I think that’s the main way they interact with our courses, but I find the teacher app good, but not great.
What do you think?
What is wonderful about Canvas? What is good, but not great? What really irritates you?