Canvas is a robust, user-friendly learning platform for your online students. But it’s only as good as the pedagogy you apply to it. While online courses are convenient and available 24/7, some students may struggle with staying engaged and on task. 

 

Here are some proven strategies for engaging your online students; whether you’re fully asynchronous or have required online meetings, these methods will help your students meet your learning objectives.

The role of course design

Good teaching begins with good course design. UCSB has created two templates- Minimal and Deluxe -  all fully tested with faculty, staff, and students. The best choice for online courses is the Deluxe template; the strategies we’ll talk about here are baked into all our templates.

 

You can access these templates via the Canvas Commons, filtering for UCSB as below:

 

 

The two templates, Minimal and Deluxe, are in the Canvas Commons. 

Establish a weekly pattern

 

When you’re not meeting your students in person, following a predictable weekly pattern is imperative so your students can anticipate and plan their workload. The weekly module structure of the homepage in our templates supports this; be sure to clearly outline the course flow. 

 

Instructional Development has a great resource on how to build your syllabus with this pattern so you can align your learning outcomes with assessments. 

 

Scaffolding - aka show, show, show

In classroom meetings, you can explain the muddy points of a reading or clarify the nuances of an assignment. Online, students may struggle in ways you can’t know until the assignments are submitted. As faculty, we have the curse of knowledge; we know the material so well we can lose sight of how difficult it can be for students. 

 

Scaffolding is usually associated with reading and writing assignments, but all assessments can benefit, especially in online courses. Beyond breaking down assignments into smaller pieces, providing exemplars supports learning. 

 

Without in-person support, it can be difficult for students to conceptualize what a successful assignment submission looks like. 

Use Rubrics to Set Clear Expectations

Rubrics for assessments are a best practice for any course modality. In fully online courses, they’re essential for your students to understand your expectations. Rubrics take time to build but can be reused. Learn how to build a rubric for your assignments in Canvas, Google, and Gradescope.

 

Sites like iRubric can help you get started. They have public gallery rubrics; you can build your own here too. Visit Instructional Development’s Grading and Rubrics guide on for a fuller explanation, examples, and ideas. 

To Meet or Not to Meet

While convenient and flexible, asynchronous classes can be a more difficult format for student engagement. Students can feel like they’re teaching themselves. It’s important to have a strong instructor presence to combat this disconnection. Presence includes posting Announcements, engaging in discussion forums, prompt grading, and multimodal support like screencasts and videos. 

 

If you can, consider holding synchronous meetings on Zoom; it’s integrated with Canvas, so it’s easy to connect with students in a meeting. These meetings are a great way to take the temperature of your class, clarify course concepts, and build community.

 

If you’re unable to meet at specific times, consider posting a regular video each week. One idea is to do it on the first day of each week; you can review what was done well the previous week and forecast next week’s materials. You can use Gauchocast for these videos.

 

Canvas integrations can help engage students with active learning. External tools like GauchoCast for interactive videos, EliReview for student feedback, Nectir for chats and polls, etc., enliven your content. If you need help using these tools or anything else related to teaching online with Canvas, get in touch.