Category Archives: Canvas

Canvas to WINS Final Grade Submission – Spring 2023

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The Spring 2023 WINS Grades Roster is open from Wednesday May 10, through noon on Tuesday May 16. The eGrading process allows instructors to transfer final grades from their Canvas Gradebook directly to their WINS Grade Roster.

Each semester, grades need to be entered into WINS. While many instructors do this manually, Canvas can help automate some of the steps for you. The Learning Technology Center is providing training on the three steps needed to push grades from Canvas so they can be accepted in WINS.

  1. Finish grading (including entering 0s) and setting the Grade Scheme
  2. Transfer grades from Canvas to WINS
  3. Verify and accept grades in WINS

Please be mindful that any ungraded items can result in different final grades showing to Teachers, Students, and/or the Student Information System (WINS), depending on the settings used by each individual. Check here for information about ensuring Total Grades are as intended: https://kb.wisconsin.edudle/page.php?id=91483

In person support sessions on this process are also available: https://my.uww.edu/SignUp/Registration/Details?id=17479

If you have any additional questions, please contact Canvas 24/7 Support. 

Canvas Update (Spring 2023)

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On Saturday April 15, Instructure deployed the latest release to the Canvas environment, and the final one before Summer 2023. The highlights of this release are listed below. The full release notes are also available.

  • Gradebook – Submit Assignment on Behalf of Student: instructors can submit a file upload assignment on behalf of a student in the Gradebook. The submission includes the timestamp and who submitted the assignment. Additionally, the instructor can submit multiple files at a time for a single student and submit beyond the availability date.
  • Gradebook – Sort Assignments by Excused Submissions and Unposted Grades: In the Gradebook, instructors can sort individual assignment columns and rows by excused submissions and unposted grades.
  • Equation Editor – Equilibrium Button: In the Rich Content Editor Equation Editor, an Equilibrium button is available.
  • Pages – Schedule Page Publication:  When editing an unpublished Page, instructors can set a publication date. Scheduled pages remain invisible to students until the publish date and time.

      New Quizzes Improvements: While New Quizzes has been available for several years now, many instructors still opt to use Classic Quizzes. Multiple updates have been made to improve New Quizzes, which will not be made in Classic.

      • New Quizzes – Allow Clearing of Multiple Choice Question Answers: In the New Quizzes settings, instructors can enable Allow Clearing Selection (Multiple Choice) allowing students to clear multiple choice answers.
      • New Quizzes – Fill in the Blank with Multiple Word Bank Improvements: In New Quizzes, when building a Fill in the Blank question with multiple word bank choices, distractor words display in a separate section for instructors. Also, word choices can be used more than once when Allow Word Bank Choices to be Reused is selected and duplicate answer choices are graded correctly. Additionally, for students, Fill in the Blank questions with multiple word banks display all word bank choices in the answer blank drop-down menu.
      • New Quizzes – Grade by Question in SpeedGrader: SpeedGrader supports grading one question at a time in New Quizzes. When in Grade by Question mode the question navigation bar is available and the Update score button location has been updated. Additionally, hyperlinks have been added to questions requiring manual grading
      • New Quizzes – Share Item Bank to Current Course Checkbox: When creating a new item bank in the New Quizzes Build page, instructors can share the bank to the current course. This change reduces extra steps to share an Item Bank and improves instructor workflows when building New Quizzes.

      If you have any questions or concerns about the service pack updates, or even just curious about how they can help you, please contact UW-W Canvas Support.

      CSD / LTC Spring Accessibility Workshops

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      Designers Should Always Keep Their Users In Mind. Only Then Can You Create Truly Innovative Solutions
      Designers should always keep their users in mind! Join us for some bite-sized lunch and learn applied workshops on building more accessible classes in Canvas.

      Join us this spring for a handful of quick “lunch and learn” workshops on accessibility and making a difference in Canvas for your students’ success! These workshops are held in person in McGraw Hall 19A or via Webex. These short workshops include 20 minutes of applied learning and demonstrations followed by 10 minutes of Q&A. Please feel free to bring a lunch!

      To sign up or for more information:

      Monday, March 13 at 12:10 pm: “The Visual Syllabus: Presenting a More Accessible, Visual Approach“
      Tuesday, March 14 at 12:10 pm: “Udoit: Course Accessibility Checker Part 1“
      Monday, April 10 at 12:10 pm: “Udoit: Course Accessibility Checker Part 2“
      Tuesday, April 11 at 12:10 pm: “What is UDL (Universal Design for Learning) and Why is it Important to Everyone?“

      2023 Course Prep Boot Camp

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      Strapped for time and looking for a guiding hand on all the things you need to do to get a Canvas course up and running for Spring?  Now is your chance! Join us for hands-on workshops broken up between quick demonstrations and supported work time.

      Photo by MART PRODUCTION from Pexels

      These sessions are designed for instructors looking to get their Spring 2023 course up and running but all faculty and staff are welcome. Come with previous content ready to be updated or moved from paper into Canvas (e.g. moving a quiz or rubric into a digital form). This series of workshops will provide you the know how and time to complete specific tasks to get your course set up. Enroll in one, a handful, or all of them; even if it is just for a way to schedule your work time.

      Getting Started

      Tuesday, January 3: Noon-1:00 p.m. | Signup

      Building Your Content

      Wednesday, January 4: Noon-1:00 p.m. | Signup

      Assignments and Setting Up Grades

      Thursday, January 5: Noon-1:00 p.m. | Signup

      Accessories

      Tuesday, January 10: Noon-1:00 p.m. | Signup

      Collaborations

      Wednesday, January 11: Noon-1:00 p.m. | Signup

      Wrapping Up

      Thursday, January 12: Noon-1:00 p.m. | Signup

      Self-Paced Online and Blended Teaching Institute

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      The UW-Whitewater Learning Technology Center (LTC) is pleased to announce registration is now available for a self-paced asynchronous version of our Online and Blended Teaching Institute (OBTI) for Spring 2023.

      OBTI aligns quality Canvas course design with best practices for teaching in a variety of modalities.  Upon completion of OBTI, faculty and instructors will be well-prepared to design and develop their own courses, prepared with tips to continue the iterative process for future academic terms. This course is most useful for people thinking about teaching in the summer or fall.

      Online and Blended Teaching Institute
      Online and Blended Teaching Institute now available in a self-paced format.

      The Online and Blended Teaching Institute offers an independent, online, self-paced experience combined with full support and contact with the Learning Technology Center.  It showcases the work of Whitewater instructors and staff, allowing participants an opportunity to explore what has worked for their colleagues.   After an initial consultation, participants will complete a series of short online assignments, be provided a sandbox to design content, and develop objectives and activities to serve as an exemplar module.  This course will take an estimated 30 hours to complete during the Spring semester.

      For more information or to enroll in this exciting training, contact Ted Witt at wittt@uww.edu. 

      Canvas Update (11/19/2023)

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      On Saturday November 19, Instructure will deploy the latest release to the Canvas environment. The highlights of this release are listed below. The full release notes are also available.

      • Outcomes – Outcome Alignment Summary Tab:  Instructors can quickly view a summary of alignments to the Outcomes in their course. Additionally, instructors can use a filter to view all Outcomes, view only those with alignments or those without alignments. 
      • Pages – Schedule Page Publication: The Schedule Page Publication default status has been updated. Instructors can delay pages for publication on a specific date and time. Scheduled pages remain invisible to students until the publish date and time.
      • SpeedGrader – Multi-File Submission Display as Single Submission for Third Party Tools: When using third-party tools to upload assignments, multiple files submitted together will display as a single submission in Speedgrader. This update allows instructors to view submissions with multiple files together in SpeedGrader.

      If you have any questions or concerns about the service pack updates, or even just curious about how they can help you, please contact UW-W Canvas Support.

      [RESOLVED] Canvas Unplanned Outage (09/21/2022)

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      RESOLVED: Between 1:00 PM and 1:45 PM on Wednesday, September 21st users may have had issues accessing Canvas. The issue has been resolved. Please reach out to Canvas 24/7 support for any additional issues.

      Beginning at roughly 1:00PM on Wednesday, September 21st users may have started receiving timeout and gateway errors when accessing Canvas. The vendor was aware of the issue and promptly began investigating.

      Resolved: 1:45PM the issue was resolved, and service was restored.

      Canvas Update (03/19/2022)

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      On Saturday March 19, Instructure deployed the latest release to the Canvas environment. The highlights of this release are listed below. The full release notes are also available.

      • Gradebook – Enhanced Gradebook Filters:  When the Enhanced Gradebook Filters feature preview is enabled for a course, instructors can create filters that can be saved or used one time.
      • Rich Content Editor – Equation Editor Update: When a user creates equations in the Rich Content Editor, the Equation Editor displays an updated user interface.
      • New Quizzes – Item Bank Filtering Terminology Adjustments: In New Quizzes item banks, the All My Banks and All My Course Banks filters have been replaced as the All Banks and Banks Shared to Course filters. Additionally, the This Course filter has been added to the filter options.

      If you have any questions or concerns about the service pack updates, or even just curious about how they can help you, please contact UW-W Canvas Support.

      Learning Analytics to Support Student Success

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      A screenshot showing the banner of Canvas New Analytics

      Canvas Learning Analytics offer instructors detailed insight into student performance and engagement, especially useful to connect with under-performing students before it is too late.

      New to Canvas Analytics? No problem! Jump into the data with an introduction on March 1 (1pm) or March 9 (9am)

      Do you already have a handle on learning analytics or are you looking for a deeper exploration? Come to the presentation, “Use Canvas Analytics for Better Teaching Learning” to explore the following questions:

      • Is there some material that can receive less in-class attention?
      • Is there some material that needs to be circled back to multiple times?
      • Is there anything I can do to identify at-risk students before it is too late?

      Register in advance for this presentation offered on March 8, 2022 at 1pm and Mach 16, 2022 at 9am!

      Consult our full calendar of events for more information about all of our workshops and presentations. The LTC offers individual and small-group consultations on a variety of topics and services – simply fill out our online consultation form to get started!