EMERGENCY HELP! 1.5hr intro Canvas training programme needed!

Discussion created by Dr Rimmer on Aug 31, 2016
Latest reply on Jan 30, 2019 by Kona Jones

Like • Show 3 Likes3
Comment • 25

Aargh, help me!

Unexpectedly running INSET (teacher pre-sessional) training on Friday morning UK time on Canvas for about 24 colleagues from senior school (ages 13-18). They will be BYOD, probably mobile telephones but maybe laptops or tablets.

What shall I do to maximise their time?

I want them to leave having seen the best that Canvas offers from the FFT account possibilities (and maybe stimulate interest in buying institutional licence...). They also need to have created a resource they can use in their classrooms the next week.

Does anyone have a ready made Canvas intro course I can get from the Commons that is 90mins approx.?

Is there anything I can do tonight to get tomorrow started more quickly...sign them up to the Canvas intro course as students...ask them to download the app, etc.?

Any and all help gratefully received...

Outcomes

25 Replies

Kona Jones Aug 31, 2016 10:29 PM
Check out mine - Canvas Instructor Training and Student Orientation - it's longer tba. 90 minutes, but you could download it and take out the stuff you didn't want to use.
12 people found this helpful
Like • Show 9 Likes9
Actions
- Kona Jones @ Kona Jones on Aug 31, 2016 10:32 PM
  Also try one called Kung Fu Canvas - I haven't personally used this, but others seem to really like it.
  13 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 9 Likes9
  Actions
biray@instructure.com Aug 31, 2016 10:43 PM
Check these out:
- Making Canvas Training Fun!
- The specified item was not found.
And I think a search for keywords "Canvas Training" or "Canvas Instructor Training" will yield solid results in Commons.
12 people found this helpful
Like • Show 8 Likes8
Actions
Stefanie Sanders Sep 1, 2016 5:48 AM
Dr Rimmer, good luck! I found the conversation here helpful, although you'll definitely have to do some distillation to fit the content into 1.5 hours: Canvas Training- 3 Levels

And one word of caution: In our training sessions, we specifically advise teachers not to attempt to create resources in Canvas using mobile devices, and especially not on mobile phones. The device and system requirements we set forth in our training sessions are "Laptop/desktop with updated internet browser (Chrome or Firefox preferably)." Your teachers and prospective Canvas users are not likely to have the best experience trying to build courses on their phones. You might want to search for a ready-made course in which you enroll all of the teachers as students, something they can view on their phones through the mobile app, to get an idea of the student experience.
12 people found this helpful
Like • Show 11 Likes11
Actions
- Kona Jones @ Stefanie Sanders on Sep 1, 2016 6:03 AM
  YES! This^
  7 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 6 Likes6
  Actions
scottd@instructure.com Sep 1, 2016 8:55 AM
Hello Dr Rimmer,

I don't know if I'm too late to give you any useful advice. You have received links to some wonderful resources. More in general I would advise keeping your presentation and goals simple. With audiences of teachers totally new to Canvas and maybe even to the concept of an LMS I used to start with a "5 things" slide deck that started with the five main benefits to teachers and students (automatically graded quizzes, they can check grades, etc). This took about five minutes. Then I would take them through several similar 'day in the life of' scenarios where they could see how it actually worked (teacher posts announcement and assignment, student logs in, gets assignment requirements, comes to class, goes back online and turns in work, teacher grades). THEN we would get everybody logged in. Even with accounts and courses created ahead of time getting logged in always took way longer than we planned for (double your estimate). Once you get them logged in, have them do simple, achievable things like setting up a Front page or syllabus description or one module. As they achieve these tasks always have one more for them to move on to.

Anyway, good luck. I'm confident that you'll have a great training. Wish I could be a fly on the wall....
9 people found this helpful
Like • Show 11 Likes11
Actions
- scottd@instructure.com @ scottd@instructure.com on Sep 1, 2016 10:11 AM
  One other thing I thought to add. I recently saw where Chris Long used a technique that I'd love to try. While doing a f2f training he had a series of slides with animated GIFs playing behind him. The animations showed the point and click steps to do a thing (set a setting for example) while he talked about the why, best practices, potential pitfalls, etc. I don't know if Chris invented this or saw it somewhere but I'd love to try that technique.
  11 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 11 Likes11
  Actions
  - Sean Nufer @ scottd@instructure.com on Sep 1, 2016 11:39 AM
    That's a great idea. I'm finding that gifs are becoming increasingly easy to create (snagit is pretty simple) and fairly effective. The key is that they have to be very relevant to what you are discussing in a F2F or else they can be visually distracting.
    6 people found this helpful
    Like • Show 6 Likes6
    Actions
  - Chris Long @ scottd@instructure.com on Sep 2, 2016 12:25 PM
    Thanks for the shout out Scott Dennis. I had not seen this done before and thought I'd give it a try. I think it turned out pretty well because if they were videos, I'd have to hit play and if I broke away from my slide deck, I'd have to take my attention off the audience. So for a fast paced session this was a great fit.
    
    Here's the Google Slide Deck I Created for this... bit.ly/canvassecrets ... Shh don't tell anyone
    9 people found this helpful
    Like • Show 6 Likes6
    Actions
    - scottd@instructure.com @ Chris Long on Sep 2, 2016 12:34 PM
      Your secret is safe with me, Chris Long...
      
      Yesterday, the illustrious Jordan Dayton shared his knowledge about animated GIF making applications that he likes. I haven't had a chance to try them myself yet but here is the info from Jordan:
      
      This is the tool I recently started using for making Screencast GIF’s. It’s brilliant, and creates super high quality, yet small GIF’s -
      http://www.cockos.com/licecap/
      
      There’s some other GIF maker tools that you may want to try, mentioned here: https://community.canvaslms.com/groups/designers/blog/2015/07/08/creating-animated-gifs-from-short-videos?commentID=22291#comment-22291
      6 people found this helpful
      Like • Show 5 Likes5
      Actions
      - Chris Long @ scottd@instructure.com on Sep 2, 2016 5:44 PM
        My go to Screencast Tool is ScreenFlow always my top recommendation for Mac Users. They recently added the animated GIF export option to it and that's what gave me the idea to try it out for my socalcanvas session.
        3 people found this helpful
        Like • Show 3 Likes3
        Actions
jordan@instructure.com Sep 1, 2016 10:13 AM
Dr Rimmer,

It looks like you received some great feedback here! Bravo to Kona Jones and Biray Seitz for noticing this last night and hopping right in to help! I hope you will come back in and share what you ended up doing, and how things worked out!

I just wanted to throw out another suggestion that might be helpful in dire moments like this! Have you had a chance to check out the new CanvasLIVE space? We just launched a CanvasLIVE 24/7 chatroom that allows Canvas users to connect and engage with others, at any time of the day, and get real-time feedback and advice! Any time you want to "talk Canvas" you are welcome to strike up a conversation in that LIVE arena!

You can join the chat by going here: CanvasLIVE Chatrooms and requesting access. You'll also be able to download the Ryver (chat tool) apps to use on the go! (Here's a short URL you can share with others: http://j.mp/canvaslivechat)

Right now we have over 100 folks registered in the chatrooms and the numbers are growing daily. I hope to see you there!
7 people found this helpful
Like • Show 7 Likes7
Actions
Dr Rimmer Sep 1, 2016 10:37 AM
You are all truly magnificent people...I thank you most sincerely for all your advice.

The Headmaster said he was so interested that he might pop by!

I'll let you know how it goes.
7 people found this helpful
Like • Show 5 Likes5
Actions
- Sean Nufer @ Dr Rimmer on Sep 1, 2016 11:40 AM
  Good luck!
  4 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 5 Likes5
  Actions
Stefanie Sanders Sep 2, 2016 6:45 AM
Dr Rimmer, we are all sitting here on tenterhooks! How did it go?
2 people found this helpful
Like • Show 4 Likes4
Actions
- Sean Nufer @ Stefanie Sanders on Sep 2, 2016 3:37 PM
  No doubt she nailed it and they're working out the paperwork as we speak to issue her a raise and an engraved trophy.
  4 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 5 Likes5
  Actions
  - Stefanie Sanders @ Sean Nufer on Sep 2, 2016 3:41 PM
    I'll drink to that!
    1 person found this helpful
    Like • Show 5 Likes5
    Actions
    - Sean Nufer @ Stefanie Sanders on Sep 2, 2016 3:45 PM
      TGIF (and a long weekend!)
      3 people found this helpful
      Like • Show 4 Likes4
      Actions
Dr Rimmer Sep 2, 2016 6:20 PM
Well, at nearly 1am Saturday (my time) I'm ready to tell you that it went okay!

Lessons learned by me:

1. Do not assume that when line manager says laptops have been organised for delivery to your classroom, that this means IT have received the request, plan to act on it, or are immediately responsive when you panic-call them 10mins after start.

2. Do not assume that, when you (luckily) find a classroom with PCs, they all work or log-on within the 90min session. Sometimes a blue frozen welcome screen is all you're gonna get!

3. Kung Fu Canvas and Make-your-own-adventure look ace, but are too big for FFT account.

4. Teachers at my school are mostly enticed by promises of auto-marked tests (quizzes) and the ease of setting meaningful, scaffolded cover work for planned absences.

I am going to call today a success.
3 people found this helpful
Like • Show 5 Likes5
Actions
- Dr Rimmer @ Dr Rimmer on Sep 2, 2016 6:08 PM
  But I definitely piqued interest, so will be running monthly Canvas workshops.
  
  One query arose: how do you add accented letters to text in Canvas? Is it part of the editing tools, perhaps through 'Add symbol' function...?
  2 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 1 Like1
  Actions
  - Stefanie Sanders @ Dr Rimmer on Sep 3, 2016 5:07 AM
    Dr Rimmer, typing accents in Canvas requires users to enable a different keyboard on their devices. It's super easy on mobile, and relatively painless on PCs and Macs. Here are some discussions on the subject for your consideration:
    
    Spanish Accent Marks?
    Typing Spanish Letters and Accents
    Students Typing in French and Spanish
    3 people found this helpful
    Like • Show 3 Likes3
    Actions
- Stefanie Sanders @ Dr Rimmer on Sep 3, 2016 5:02 AM
  Welcome to the world of training, Dr Rimmer! Overall, this certainly sounds like a win to me.
  
  With respect to Kung Fu Canvas, some users quickly ran into the course size issue, so Mike Cowen made a streamlined version available in Commons, called "Kung Fu Canvas (with videos linked)." The size of the course file for that version is 436.55MB. Sadly, the course file storage quota in FFT accounts is 250MB. I'm sorry that wasn't a go for you.
  
  Thanks for letting us know what features your teachers found particularly appealing! When I was soliciting buy-in from faculty at my campus, I went around to their buildings and demonstrated SpeedGrader. *mic drop*
  2 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 2 Likes2
  Actions
  - Mike Cowen @ Stefanie Sanders on Sep 6, 2016 3:59 PM
    Stefanie Sanders & Dr Rimmer,
    
    I know its a little too late for this scenario, but the Kung Fu Canvas (with videos linked) course has just been updated in Commons.
    
    All the videos (except 2) are now available on Youtube and Vimeo. Those are now linked so the course size is less than 100MB and small enough to be used on Free For Teachers (FFT supports up to 250MB).
    
    Kona Jones, thanks for mentioning the course
    
    5 people found this helpful
    Like • Show 3 Likes3
    Actions
natalie mackie Jan 30, 2019 7:59 PM
I haven't been to school in 40 years! Now I can't find the "intro Letter" thats due tomorrow! Help! Please!
Like • Show 0 Likes0
Actions
- Kona Jones @ natalie mackie on Jan 30, 2019 8:14 PM
  natalie, greetings! I'm not sure if you realized it or not, but you posted this in the global Community of all Canvas Users. Your question seems course (school) specific, so your best bet is probably going to be contacting your Instructor to see if they can help.
  
  Yet, if this is an assignment or document, you can try checking your "To Do" list, the Calendar in Canvas, the Syllabus, the Modules page, or Files for your course.
  
  Hope you find what you are needing!
  Kona
  2 people found this helpful
  Like • Show 0 Likes0
  Actions

EMERGENCY HELP! 1.5hr intro Canvas training programme needed!

Outcomes

Related Content

Recommended Content