Our school is approaching its 3rd year of using Canvas. As the newly arrived Instructional coach/designer/digital learning co-ordinator, I wanted to create a ready reckoner that staff could use to check the progress of their Canvas courses. With one thing or another, it has taken me longer than I wanted. This blog shows where I've got up to.
Leaning heavily on the ideas in Course Evaluation checklist that can be found in the community (Course Evaluation Checklist v3.0 - Instructure Community - 574446 (canvaslms.com) I've designed an Excel spreadsheet model that staff can use to give an overall view of their Canvas courses development. The spreadsheet model could just as easily be adapted to a single course.
The spreadsheet has a menu screen with links to 7 features:
- Course Information
- Course Structure
- Learner Interaction
- Learner Accessibility
- Assessments (and External Tools)
- Summary Chart
All of which are on separate sheets
There is an additional sheet which contains the calculations that is hidden from the user. The formula cells for each sheet are protected in case of accidental deletion and staff can only enter data for each element.
The main page looks like this:
The Rating menu indicates the importance of the feature eg 3 stars is very important. I made this using the Rept function which repeats text a number of times and got the computer to repeat a filled or unfilled unichar star in the calculations sheet by its rating value in another cell in the calculations sheet.
Staff fill out the score based on the 0-4 scale next to it. When they do this, the cell turns a particular colour (rather than give a number) eg
The 'magic' then happens in the calculations page as it takes the number for each score, multiplies it by the rating 'rating' eg If you gave a Sometimes (2 mark) score to a 1 star rating then you would score 2 (out of a maximum of 4). The scoring system is designed to give greater weight and value to the higher rating scores.
The overall score is converted into a percentage and a vlookup table on the (hidden) Calculations sheet gives a comment. I used a Foundational/Functional/Mastery/Impact/Innovation scale adapted from Mandinach and Cline's (1992) work on teachers learning new tech.
I designed one lookup table for all the sections, so this probably needs developing further!
There is a Home button to take you back to the menu and then you can complete a different section eg Learner Interactions: (oops beginning does not have 3ns)
Finally, there is a simple Summary Chart so you can see your progress in all six areas:
So, its sort of work in progress and will (hopefully) be refined, ready and available for the start of next academic term.
Always happy to share the file with anyone who wishes to develop/tweak it for their own place.
Thoughts always welcome....
