Authors: Chasina Worman and Loryn Martini
Have you ever stared at a blank screen and thought, “I have no idea what to do?” Have you ever heard students complaining that they can’t find assignments on a teacher’s course? A common struggle for many instructors is creating highly interactive, easy to navigate, and attractive Canvas courses - especially from scratch. Building from a blank Canvas can be difficult. This can result in disorganized courses or disconnected content which overwhelms or confuses students and observers, negatively impacting their learning experience. A helpful solution to these conundrums is to use Canvas Course Templates. As an administrator, creating or encouraging the use of Course Templates can streamline content, organization, and learning. It can also save instructors time in content creation and give them an outline or backbone from which to format their course. Course Templates can make using Canvas easier for both teachers and for students.
A Course Template can be created at the district level, for a specific school, or even a specific grade level or subject area. They are versatile and provide teachers with suggested (or required) formatting for their classes. This can give them a head start in creating their courses if they already have an idea of the expected layout and required content. A Course Template can be configured to provide continuity in design, institutional branding, clear navigation, and a model best practices. And if a teacher has a different idea for how they want to organize their class, they can, because Course Templates are easy to edit. Teachers can control what they use and what they edit without affecting the original, so they can make it specific to their students and their classroom. But having a Course Template off of which to base their class can prevent teachers from staring at a blank screen, wondering what to do next. It can also help teachers with organization so that content and expectations are easy for students to find.
Here are a few examples from schools in Alaska:
The Lower Kuskokwim School District uses Templates to provide a suggested starting point for teachers while allowing for customization and branding.
Teacher Templates
Common icons, and navigation helps students as they travel from teacher to teacher.
Each template also includes a short tutorial for students on how to use the course.
In 2022-2023, Kenia Peninsula Borough School District will be using two, innovative Templates for professional development and for principals.
KPBSD responded to the need to standardize the delivery of professional development. Templates will be used to increase efficiency and effectiveness of PD by shifting their time from design and navigation into the creation and delivery of content. The added bonus is that staff will become more accustomed to a standard format as a learner and apply those practices in their classroom to benefit their students.
Professional Development Templates
In addition to streamlining Professional Development, KPBSD will provide a uniform system for how school administrators communicate with their staff. More than 50% of administrators were new as of the 2021-2022 school year which created an immediate need for a centralized process to lessen the learning curve and streamline crucial communication. We have found that in schools in which principals use Canvas, teacher adoption is higher.
Principal Templates
Course Templates are a wonderful way to encourage organization, content creation and curation, and communication. The power of the Course Template reaches far beyond the classroom, into administrative communication with faculty and staff as well as professional development. If you are interested in learning more about Course Templates, reach out to our design team or your Canvas Consultant, if applicable. There are also the Ready-Made Design Packages. Feel free to comment below if you’ve used any templates or if you have found this article helpful.
