Faculty Hub
Canvas Faculty Hub
Welcome to the Canvas Faculty Hub. This hub space was curated for OHIO instructors to learn more about the transition to Canvas and to maximize its features for a modern, intuitive teaching and learning experience.
91探花 faculty, staff, and students selected , by Instructure through a robust evaluation process to improve the teaching and learning experience for students and faculty. Canvas provides a modern, accessible, and intuitive learning management system (LMS) and is available for all OHIO faculty to explore and set up courses. The material in this Canvas Hub was developed collaboratively by the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Assessment, the Office of Instructional Design, and the Office of Information Technology. The goal of this collaboration is to encourage campus-wide adoption of Canvas in order to 1) create a sense of community and a common OHIO experience; 2) support student time management, study skill sets and meta-cognition; and 3) promote teaching effectiveness and efficiency.
Blackboard Retirement
All 91探花 instructors can access until June 2026. Instructors should review their course content in Blackboard and determine what should be migrated to Canvas, saved, or deleted.
- Only migrate content to Canvas that is high quality and relevant to ongoing teaching activities.
- Save content outside of Canvas for record-keeping purposes (eg, saving a grade book in OneNote). Or, if you're unsure if the content will be utilized in the future, save it for your personal records.
- Delete unnecessary content. This can assist you in keeping track of reviewed materials and help reduce significant storage costs associated with Blackboard.
Before getting started, we recommend to review information about the differences between Blackboard and Canvas, and .鈥疨hase 1 faculty praised Canvas as an improvement to managing their course, as compared to Blackboard. With all publisher and third party integrations, course-level analytics, this tool has many features to support student engagement.
To Get Started Teaching in Canvas, Follow These Steps
- Log In to Canvas: Visit and use your OHIO email and password to log in.
- Locate your test course: All instructors have one test course automatically created in their Canvas account. A test course can be leveraged to explore Canvas features or used to build content for future 鈥渞eal鈥 courses. Your test course should appear on your Canvas Dashboard and in your Courses tab in the left navigation menu. The course name will include 鈥淚nstructor Test Course鈥 and your OHIO ID.
- If you鈥檇 like additional test courses, you can submit a .
- Apply an OHIO template: Review the OHIO course templates and using Canvas Commons. OHIO course templates are pedagogically sound, efficient for instructors, and provide a consistent and cohesive experience for students.
- Design your course: Build your course assessments, activities, and content.
Recommended Features
In addition to templates, we strongly recommend that all faculty use the Canvas Syllabus, and Course Calendar features. Using these functions will help students maximize the utility of the calendar and to do list functions, both of which appear on the homepage for students. If faculty use these features, students can see all of upcoming assignments, other due dates, and more in one easy-to-navigate space.
Finish building your course by developing modules, adding assignments, importing content, and linking Panopto videos and other media.
Students will not be able to access your course content until you publish it. This is equivalent to making your course available in Blackboard. To help students know which LMS their course will be taught in, send them an email or other outreach to let them know how to access the course. You should contact them prior to the first day of class to help them prepare.
Course Templates
We encourage all instructors to use an OHIO Canvas template as you set-up your Canvas courses. Course templates are efficient, user-friendly, pedagogically sound, sleek, and professional. The use of templates will help students experience a predictable organizational structure and consistent visual feel across their Canvas courses. OIT has guidance for once you review the options.
Explore OHIO course templates
Example of Custom Template
Example of In person template
Templates enable you to auto-populate announcements
Get Help with Canvas
Support for Everyone
- 24/7 Canvas Support: All students, faculty, and staff have access to a 24/7 Help Desk in by selecting "Get Help鈥.鈥疌anvas Support can help with any Canvas-specific issue through chat or phone support. Canvas will connect customers with OIT support if support is requested for a non-Canvas issue.
- : OIT will continue to support all users with issues relating to passwords, access to any platform, single sign-on, requests for new products or features. Additionally, OIT creates for faculty (also called test, sandbox, dev, or prime courses).
Instructor Resources
To get started with Canvas on your own:
- : Instructors of record will be automatically enrolled in 鈥淕rowing with Canvas鈥, a self-paced, optional introduction to the platform.
- Individual consultations and help material: OIT offers written help material, consultations with instructional technologists, and more to help you navigate and maximize Canvas.
- Frequently Asked Questions: For more information, please visit the Frequently Asked Questions page.
- : The Canvas Experts Corner blog is your weekly dose of inspiration and expert guidance to elevate your Canvas experience. Going beyond basic how-to's, we'll dive into advanced features and explore innovative teaching strategies to help you create an engaging learning experience for students.
To access workshops, seminars, and consultations:
- : Trainings and workshops presented by Canvas will be available throughout the summer covering a wide variety of topics. Visit the CTLA's GivePulse website to learn more and register.
- Faculty Canvas training (pre-scheduled and by department/unit request): Led by OID with support from OIT. Trainings address everyone from the basics of Canvas to using external tools and developing assessments.
- : Work with an instructional designer to design and prepare to teach your course in Canvas.
- New Faculty Welcome: Resources for new faculty to support teaching excellence. This will include content updated over time to highlight upcoming events.
- Graduate Student Instructor Resources: General material and information about upcoming events to help graduate students prepare for a successful teaching experience.
Accessibility
91探花 is committed to providing cutting-edge information technology that provides our students with an accessible and exceptional user experience. Canvas and OHIO have both created resources to ensure your Canvas course content is accessible to each student you teach:
Student Resources
When students reach out to you with questions, please remind them of the below support available for them.
- : Students can self-enroll in the optional, self-paced training course 鈥淧assport to Canvas鈥 to explore the platform and learn about its basic functions.鈥疘nstructors are also welcome to self-enroll in this course to explore training material available to students.
- Access Canvas through Go OHIO: Students can log into Canvas directly at and also through the Go OHIO app. They also have the option to sign up for Canvas notifications through Go OHIO to stay up-to-date on new Canvas updates and information.
- : Student-focused help material developed to address common student questions in Canvas.鈥疧IT will continue to add to these resources as additional feedback is received from students.