Getting Started (New Faculty)

These are the essential first steps to help you get oriented in Canvas and begin working with your course content and settings. This section is designed for instructors who are new to Canvas or just getting started at UW Tacoma.

Log in to Canvas

Visit canvas.uw.edu and log in with your UW NetID and password.

Update Your Profile & Notifications

Click Account > Profile to personalize your account, and Account > Notifications to adjust how and when you receive alerts.

• How do I edit my profile?
• How do I set my notification preferences? 

Access Your Courses

Your official Canvas course shells are created automatically once you’re listed as the instructor of record in the time schedule. These typically appear on your Canvas Dashboard several months before the term begins, once the instructor assignments are finalized. See Canvas course availability for specific quarter access dates.

If you don’t see a course you expect to teach, first check the Time Schedule to confirm you're listed as the instructor of record. If you're not listed, reach out to your department to request any necessary updates or corrections. If you are listed in the Time Schedule, see if you can locate your Canvas course in the “All Courses” list.

• How do I use the All Courses list as an instructor? 

View Student Enrollments

Students are automatically enrolled in your Canvas course based on their official registration. You can view and manage participants using the People tool in your course. TAs or co-instructors not officially listed in the Time Schedule can be added manually. Ensure all TA’s complete FERPA training prior to adding them to any Canvas course.

You should not add students to a course manually! If a student should have access but does not, they should contact UW IT (help@uw.edu). 

• How do I manage people in a course? 

Explore Canvas Navigation

Get familiar with the Dashboard and the course navigation menu.  Once your course is built, hide any unneeded navigation items in your course to streamline the learning experience for your students.

• How do I use the Dashboard as an instructor?
• How do I manage Course Navigation links?

Combine or Cross-list Multiple Sections

Sometimes you may be teaching multiple sections of a course that are not officially joined in the time schedule, but students receive the same instruction and complete the same assignments. As long as the courses do not have separate physical meeting times and spaces, an instructor can have a single course site in Canvas. 

When cross-listing courses in Canvas, some sections from one course are attached to the course that contains the content, the "target" course. Student enrollments continue to update automatically in all sections, but the instructor only maintains the content in the target course site.

Now that you're set up and familiar with the Canvas interface, it's time to begin building your course. This section walks you through organizing materials, adding assignments, and setting up the key components that will support your students throughout the term.

The UWT Canvas Template

If you are building a new course, you may choose to use the pre-populated UW Tacoma Template in the Canvas Commons. For help importing the template (or any other Canvas Commons resource), see "How do I import and view a Commons resource in Canvas?" or contact Chris Lott (clott@uw.edu).

Step-by-step guide:

1. Log into Canvas and select Commons located in the global navigation bar on the left.
2. Find the template: In the search bar type the name of the template you want to use.
   1. General Campus Template: UW Tacoma Template 2024
   2. Milgard School of Business: UWT - Milgard School of Business Template
3. Click the title of the template to view its details.
4. Click the Import/Download button on the right side of the template's screen.
5. Select your course(s) from the list that appears.
6. Click the Import into Course button to begin the process. 

You may also want to check with your unit leadership and peer faculty to see if other templates, previous courses, or materials are available to you to learn from or adapt.

Making Course Materials Accessible

The US Department of Justice’s update on digital accessibility (part of the Americans with Disabilities Act) requires that digital academic course content be accessible. Meeting this standard is not only a legal expectation but also an action consistent with UW’s mission and values. 

Aligned with UW’s Digital Accessibility Initiative, there are initial actions that instructors can take to begin improving the accessibility of their digital course materials. The guidance on the Making Course Material Accessible page intentionally focuses on common types of course materials used across disciplines in hopes of moving as many people as possible toward compliance.

Create an accessible Home Page (your syllabus can also act as a homepage)

Build a welcoming landing page that includes your photo, contact info, course overview, and navigation instructions. Once created, you can set it as the Front Page and make it the course Home.

• How do I create a new page in a course?
• Making Canvas Pages Accessible
• How do I set a Front Page in a course?

Build your accessible Syllabus

Building a syllabus directly in Canvas will put you on the quickest path toward accessibility. Unlike Word or PDF documents, Canvas uses HTML, which makes text more adaptable for different screen sizes and works well with screen readers.

• How do I edit the Syllabus in a course?

Link out to the E-Syllabus 

In partnership with Faculty Assembly, we have created an Online E-syllabus for UW Tacoma Policies and Expectations, Academic Support and Self & Family Resources. This will reduce the number of pages in your syllabus, and you will not have to worry about whether links have changed or need updating. We do that for you!

Organize with Modules

Modules let you structure your course content by week, topic, or unit. Each module can include pages, files, assignments, quizzes, and more.

• How do I add a module?
• How do I add course content to a module?
   

Upload and Link Files

Upload files, slides, and readings under the Files area, then link them into Pages or Modules so students can easily access them.

• How do I upload a file to a course?
• How do I link to a file in a course?
• Making Assigned Reading Accessible
• Making Assignments and Handouts Accessible
• Making Slide Decks Accessible 

Storing and Sharing Large Files

Canvas has a 500MB storage limit for each course, which makes it best suited for basic documents like doc’s, slides, and readings. For larger files—especially videos—UW provides other tools that integrate smoothly with Canvas.

Use OneDrive for Large Files and Shared Documents

OneDrive for Business is a UW Office 365 cloud service that connects you to all your files. It lets you store and protect your files, share them with others, and get to them from anywhere on all your devices. You can link directly to Box files from within Canvas for easy student access.

• Learn more about OneDrive

Build Assignments and Quizzes

Set up Assignments to collect student work and create Quizzes for assessments or surveys. You can use Classic Quizzes or the newer New Quizzes tool depending on your preference.

• How do I create an assignment?
• How do I create a quiz using New Quizzes?
• How do I create a quiz using Classic Quizzes?
• Classic vs New Quizzes Feature Comparison

Making videos and recorded Lectures Accessible

Use Panopto for Videos.

Panopto is the UW-IT supported lecture capture solution. Panopto allows for easy recording and reviewing of videos from courses, lectures, and presentations. As a cloud-enabled service, Panopto is designed to simplify the lecture capture process. Recordings in Panopto are viewable on most Web browsers and mobile devices. For Panopto support contact tachelp@uw.edu.

• Learn more about Panopto

Once your content is in place, take a few final steps to ensure everything is ready for students. This section covers grade settings, quality checks, and course availability before you publish.

Check the Gradebook and Settings

Make sure your assignments are grouped and weighted properly, and enable a grading scheme if your course uses letter grades.

• How do I weight the final course grade based on assignment groups?
• How do I enable a grading scheme for a course?

Use the Student View

Preview your course exactly as students will see it. This is a great way to verify visibility, navigation, and due dates.

• How do I view a course as a test student using Student View?
   

Run the Link Validator

Scan your course for any broken or outdated links to help prevent student confusion or frustration.

• How do I validate links in a course? 

Check Accessibility with Ally

Use the built in accessibility checker called Ally to check for accessibility issues in your course content and help ensure an inclusive learning environment. UW has set an minimum accessibility score of 80%.

• Ally Overview

Review Start/End Dates

By default, UW Canvas course open dates are set to the first official day of the quarter. You can adjust this under Settings > Course Details.

• How do I change the start and end dates for a course?
• UW Tacoma Academic Calendar
   

Publish Your Course

Your course is hidden from students until it's published. Once you're ready, click Publish on the course home page to make it visible.

• How do I publish a course?