Communicating with Students in Canvas

Description

Canvas offers two ways to communicate with your students, Messaging and Announcements. Messaging leverages the Inbox tool to support direct messaging between students and instructors.  Inbox messages and Announcements are contained within Canvas and cannot be forcibly sent via email. Students and instructors can edit their notification settings if they want to receive email notifications about Announcements or Inbox messages. These messaging and announcement features in Canvas can be used to support dynamic communication with students in your course.

Environment

Canvas web and mobile 

Solution 

Inbox (Messaging) 

Canvas supports direct messaging within Canvas between instructors and students through their 'Inbox' tool. Inbox is a two-way messaging tool that is used instead of email to communicate with a course, group, or individual user. Anywhere in Canvas that you see the envelope icon indicates that you can have direct communication with your students. 

While the Inbox tool may seem inconvenient or unnecessary, it does add some benefits. There is an audit trail of all messages sent between the instructor and students within Canvas, should there be a grade dispute or other area of concern. Students have said they find it convenient to have all the related course materials and communications collected in one location. All their messages about a specific course are searchable within that course.  

Here are some guides from Canvas that explain the Inbox tool in more detail:

• What is the Inbox? 

• How do I use the Inbox as an instructor? 

• How do I use the Inbox as a student? 

Announcements 

In Canvas, students control how they receive notifications for announcements. Some may choose to receive these by email or another method, but Canvas does not "force" an email to students when announcements are posted. Announcements will appear for students in their Recent Activity Dashboard, their To Do list, and within their course.

• What are Announcements? 
• How do I allow or disallow announcement replies in a course?

Notifications 

So, if you can’t directly email students through Canvas, and you can’t force your Announcements to be sent via email, how do you ensure that your students are receiving your communications in a timely fashion? We recommend that you take a bit of time in your first class session to talk with your students about the Notifications options in Canvas.  

While you cannot force an email message to your students, you and your students can opt to receive email notifications about certain types of communications and notices within Canvas. You can select whether you want to be notified immediately, daily, weekly, or not at all for a vast list of course activities. And if you are using one of the Canvas mobile apps, you can set push notifications for these areas as well. Please note that you will have to enable push notifications for the app on your mobile device as well.

Here are some guides from Canvas that explain notification settings in more detail:

• How do I manage my Canvas notification settings as an instructor? 

• How do I manage my Canvas notification settings as a student? 

• Video demo of managing Canvas notifications

Get help from Canvas

• Live chat with Canvas support (Faculty) 
• Get 24-hours/7-days a week Canvas support  
  • Dial the Canvas Support Hotline number located under "Get Help" in the Canvas Global Navigation Menu 
  • Contact OIT at 740‑593‑1222 if you need help logging in, accessing test or practice courses, or using tools that connect to Canvas.

Get Help from OIT

• Use the Canvas Learning Management System (LMS) ticket form to submit a help ticket 
• Visit the Technology Resources and Training page for available training 

Additional resources

• How do I add Requirements to a Module?  
• How do I add Prerequisites to a Module?  
• Canvas Basics Guide  
• Canvas Instructor Guide  
• Canvas Video Guide 
• Mobile Guides 
• Canvas Course Accessibility Checklist