What if you could easily include audio or video comments as part of a course discussion or comments? With Canvas, you can. All you need is a computer or mobile device with a microphone and camera—and Canvas does the rest. Multimedia messages can be attached to personal messages, assignments, discussions and even graded work. View this guide to learn more.

Learning happens everywhere. That’s why Canvas mobile apps for iOS and Android give students and teachers the tools they need to make it happen whenever and wherever they are. From SpeedGrader for iPad to multimedia discussions that allow you to upload videos recorded on your phone or tablet, Canvas takes learning way beyond the classroom.

With real-time audio, video, and whiteboard capabilities, Canvas’ Web conferencing tools help students and teachers stay connected. For fully online and blended courses alike, Web conferencing enables group collaboration, office hours, and real-time presentations—so distance students feel a lot less distant. Get started with Canvas Web Conferencing.

As an instructor, SpeedGrader allows you to view and grade student assignment submissions in one place using a simple point scale or complex rubric. Canvas accepts a variety of document formats and even URLs as assignment submissions. Some document assignments can be marked up for feedback directly within the submission. You can also provide feedback to your students with text or media comments. View a video about speedgrader and learn more by viewing the guides.

Turnitin is a plagiarism detection tool which you can use in Canvas. You can enable Turnitin as part of a new Canvas assignment. Turnitin is enabled on a per-assignment basis in Canvas. Turnitin uses your user role for authentication and uses your Canvas account to create and manage assignments. Learn how to create a Turnitin assignment by viewing the guide.

The attendance tool allows instructors to easily take attendance electronically, in either a list or a grid format. The tool has the option to create seating charts and “attendance” as an assignment, adding it to the gradebook. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Canvas includes the Course Setup Tutorial to help you become accustomed to the steps required to make a course. The tutorial displays helpful information and tips on each Canvas Index Page. To learn more, view the Canvas Guides. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Canvas allows you to easily store files and assignments within Canvas for you and your students to find. You can upload one or multiple files, view all details about your files, preview files, publish and unpublished files, set usage rights, and restrict access to files. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Canvas uses course analytics to show you activity, assignment submissions, grades, and students in both active and concluded classes. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Canvas uses student analytics in order to allow you to see how well a student is doing in a course. The student analytics includes the student’s activity in the course by date, their communication with the professor, their assignment submissions, and their grades. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Canvas is all about usability. From the very beginning, it was designed with end-users in mind, so its real power comes from its simplicity. In study after study, users of all abilities say Canvas’ interface is clean, intuitive, and easy to navigate. This minimizes user frustration, reduces support costs, and ultimately, lets Canvas users focus on what’s truly important—whether that’s calculus, English lit, finance or medicine.

Empowering students to take responsibility for their own learning is one of the most important ways to eliminate loss from the learning process. With Learning Mastery for Students in Canvas, students can quickly see and understand their own progress toward mastering key outcomes. This gives them the information they need to focus their time and efforts and helps ensure they don’t lose sight of academic goals.

One of the challenges facing both students and instructors is keeping track of all of the assignments planned throughout the term. Instructors are teaching multiple courses and students are learning in multiple courses. Every course has its own timeline for when things need to be done. The Calendar helps everyone stay on schedule and up to date. Learn more about the calendar by visiting the student and instructor guides

Conversations is the messaging tool used instead of email to communicate with a course, a group, an individual student, or a group of students. Conversations are stored in the inbox which is located on the global menu. Learn when to use Conversations. 

Canvas includes a set of default notification preferences you can receive for your courses. Notifications are sent to Canvas contact methods as specified in your account. However, you can change the default settings by setting your own notification preferences. These preferences only apply to you; they are not used to control how course updates are sent to other users. To learn more about each notification, default settings, and notification triggers, view the Canvas Notifications.

The Dashboard is your starting point in Canvas. It displays the course cards for your courses and includes global announcements from your institution; a global activity stream that shows recent activity in your courses; and a sidebar, which contains the To Do list, upcoming events, and access to grades. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Canvas offers many ways for you to get the help you need quickly. The help icon explains how to access the Canvas guides, support hotline, live chat, and report a problem. Canvas support is available 24/7, 365 days a year. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Personalize your user account by adding a profile picture, your biography, contact information, and shareable links. The Account tab also contains notification methods for courses and changeable settings. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Students, you can view your grades based on What-If scores to determine how upcoming or resubmitted assignments will affect your grades. You can test scores for assignments that have or have not been graded. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Announcements shows you updates in your courses and replies to announcements. For more information about Student replies please visit the student and instructor guides.

The chat tool allows students and instructors to connect when they are online, have group discussions, and have group study sessions. The chat history is accessible to all users in the course. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

The Course Activity Stream gives you recent notifications for a selected course, such as announcements, assignments, and conversations. You can easily post to discussion forums and ask questions directly from the stream. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

The Global Activity Stream gives you recent notifications from all of your courses, such as announcements, discussions, assignments, and conversations. You can easily post to discussion forums and ask questions directly from the stream. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Once placed into a group, students have access to a collaborative workplace where they can create pages, announcements, discussions, and calendar events. Students can also join their own groups and leadership roles can be assigned to specific users. For more details view the Canvas Guides.

Canvas allows you to create collaborations with a Google Drive. These collaborations can include Google Documents, Spreadsheets, or Presentations for individual users or groups. For more details view the Canvas Guides.