Sharing to an Entire Class/Creating a Group for an Entire Class

[TrishaMeyer1]

My institution has both Canvas LMS and Canvas Studio. I have a pretty good handle on how to embed Studio media in a Canvas course, but I'm trying to understand how to use Canvas Studio as a stand-alone product (for our teachers who refuse to use Canvas LMS) to share content from YouTube. I see how to Share Media and how to Create Groups (which should simplify Sharing to a large number of people, I presume). But both seem to require me to type in individual email addresses. How can I either Share to my entire Canvas course roster or create a Group of my entire roster without having to type each email?

I feel as though I must be missing something, but I've looked and looked and can't figure out how to do this.

I am trying to share Canvas Studio content via Google Classroom. Conceptually it works, but only if I Share the media to the student(s) first. Some teachers have upwards of 200 students.

Note: Our district blocks YouTube, so Sharing the file as a link is not an option. It has to be shared as a Studio file.

Any advice?

[Chris_Hofer · Accepted solution]

Hi @TrishaMeyer1 ...

To be honest, I've not heard of a way to use Canvas Studio as a stand-alone product.  The way I have always understood Canvas Studio is that it is a paid add-on product to Canvas.  Instructors and Canvas administrators can upload user-created videos to their own Studio libraries, or they can copy/paste URLs from either YouTube or Vimeo into their own Studio libraries.  Then, once that has been completed, instructors can embed videos from their Studio library to their Canvas courses so that students can view them.  Instructors have an option of turning on a discussion-type interface that appears below the embedded videos in case the instructor wants students to be able to comment on the videos.  Instructors are always able to gain insights on the videos such as who is watching the video and what parts of a video are being watched.  Each video in your Studio library can also generate a "public" URL (anyone with the link that view the video...even those outside of Canvas).  Or, you can also generate/harvest embed code for any video in your library so that you can embed a Studio video on an external website such as a blog page.  There are sharing options as well for each of your videos.  For example, you can share a video with a fellow instructor and give him/her editing rights or just viewing rights for that video (that setting is up to you).  For example, you might share a video with an instructor and give editing rights to that person who might help you edit the captions of the video.

I've not used the "Groups" feature within Canvas Studio too much at all, but I assume that you are referring to this: How do I share media with a group in Canvas Studio? 

I hope this information will be helpful in some way.  If there is anything I didn't cover or you have further questions about, just post a reply, and I'll try to respond...thanks!

[TrishaMeyer1]

Thanks, @Chris_Hofer , it's always good to hear from you!

I didn't realize that Canvas Studio could not be used as a stand-alone product, but that doesn't really change our situation. It is good to know for future planning, though.

I'm trying to find a way for our non-Canvas users to assign YouTube videos to their students. The Canvas Studio YouTube for Education feature seems like it might be a viable solution, but when I suggested it to district leadership, the response I got was "not everyone uses Canvas." So I was doing some experimentation to see if Canvas Studio could be used to produce content that could then then be shared elsewhere (such as Google Classroom). For teacher-produced content, the answer is easy: download as an MP4. But YouTube content can't be downloaded; it can only be linked.

The "Share as a public link" doesn't work because we block YouTube, so the link gets blocked too. The only way to avoid the block is to share the Canvas Studio version.

Regardless, I think I have my answer. It is possible to use Canvas Studio content, even YouTube, with Google Classroom, but the process is so unwieldy that teachers would be better off just using Canvas (which I think they should do anyway, but that's just my opinion).

Thanks again for chiming in!