Canvas allows instructors and students to control where and when they receive notifications about Canvas activity. As you determine your communication plan, think about how notifications can support timely interactions with your students.

• Ensure students receive your communications promptly by directing them to set up their personal notifications.

Consider setting up a discussion in Canvas for “questions about this course.” This is a space where students could seek clarification from the instructor and each other.

• See the Instruct section of this site for more detailed information about using Canvas discussions as class activities.

The Canvas Inbox (also known as Canvas Conversations) is an email tool within Canvas.

• Use the Inbox to send a message to all students in a course or send a message to one or more specific students

• Filter Inbox conversations to help you stay organized and manage your messages.

Instructors can post an announcement for everyone in their courses through Canvas.

• Announcements are typically sent as an email, be sure students know this is dependent on notification settings.

• Leave the “Announcements” section viewable in the left navigation so that the archive of information is available to students.

• Manage announcement replies to allow or restrict further student conversation.

Email is an efficient way to communicate with your students. Gmail is the email tool that is affiliated with your @umn.edu email address.

• The Google Course Groups option uses official U of M course data to create an email group for all members of your course. You can easily send group emails and share Google Drive items.

• Filters in Gmail can help you manage a large volume of emails by setting up parameters to route incoming emails based on sender, subject, content, and/or size of the message.

Video conferencing tools enable real-time conversations.

Zoom is the University’s video conferencing and webinar tool. It can be used to meet with students individually or in small groups, host virtual office hours, or run a synchronous class session.

• Use Zoom to meet with students individually or in small groups

• Use Zoom with Canvas to set up virtual office hours

  • 1. Create a calendar event in Canvas.

    2. Attach a Zoom meeting invite to provide a virtual space that any student in your course can join.

• Use Zoom to teach a synchronous class session

  • While this may seem like a logical way to replace a face-to-face class session, there are many technical challenges to hosting and presenting in a large group meeting. If your main goal is delivering content, recording a video may be a simpler option.

Google Hangouts is another video conferencing option that is supported by the University. It is recommended for hosting smaller meetings with no more than 25 people.

• Set up meetings with Google Hangouts

• Use Google Hangouts with Google Calendar to set up virtual office hours

  • 1. Schedule a video meeting in Google Calendar.

    2. Invite your whole class to the event so that anyone can join the session during the designated time.