I have used CANVAS as a student in several college classes, but I have not used it as a teacher in a Spanish high school class. This school year, when teachers had to teach remotely, the school district where I worked adopted CANVAS as the one and only LMS. Before the pandemic, each teacher was using their preferred digital tools to communicate, facilitate learning, and collaborate. Parents and students had a difficult time learning and using the great collection of tools being used as a whole. Consequently, the district decided for all teachers to adopt CANVAS, in an effort to facilitate a shared consistent system for all families. For me, the switch was a bitter-sweet experience. I had spent the last four years learning all about Google tools, and developing my Google classroom. At first, the switch to CANVAS seemed very time consuming and some features just did not seem as effective as other tools I was using. As I learned more how to best use CANVAS, I was reinspired. One appealing aspect of CANVAS is that it offers many opportunities for collaboration – student-student, teacher-student, & teacher-teacher. Standard for Educators 4 refers to this important aspect of teaching and learning, “How can educators dedicate time to collaborate with both colleagues and students to improve practice, discover and share resources and ideas, and solve problems?” This standard led me to the following question: What tool or tools in CANVAS foster collaboration amongst colleagues and students?
Amongst the many features that CANVAS offers, Groups, Discussions, Collaborations and a Community are amongst the main features in CANVAS that help create a culture of collaboration.
Groups
In the guide What are Groups?, it is suggested to use groups when facilitating 1) student projects, 2) faculty professional development, and 3) student-run study groups. CANVAS Groups offer students a place to communicate with peers, store and share files, and collaborate. While there are many platforms where students can do this, CANVAS Groups allows instructors to view all activity within the groups, interact with the group members, and invite other teachers and students that can serve as mentors or experts to the group.
Discussions
CANVAS Groups facilitate communication through discussion groups, which are part of Groups. In the article Collaboration vs Communication in a Digital World, Carter explains that “You simply can’t collaborate with someone unless you can communicate with them first.” Yet, communicating with someone does not equate to collaboration. This article explains that while communication provides the connection between different people, collaboration is the contribution to a shared project, and concludes that “collaboration and communication need to exist in harmony together.” In the classroom, I can think of several examples where students “collaborate” on a project with little communication, such as the common “divide and conquer” approach to collaboration. In this scenario, students simply split the work without sharing their thoughts, ideas, and experiences, nor learning from one another. An important role of educators is to facilitate and foster an environment where students can communicate and collaborate.
Research shows that collaborative learning enhances critical thinking and learning (Gokhale, 1995). “Proponents of collaborate learning claim that the active exchange of ideas within small groups not only increases interest among the participants but also promotes critical thinking.” (p. 22). It is through the discussions, exchange of ideas, and mutual support that students benefit. For this kind of collaboration to exist, there needs to be good communication. Teachers can model and coach students on how to develop a protocol for effective and respectful communicative interactions that will set the foundation for successful collaboration.
The article How to design effective online group work activities from Faculty Focus includes tips on how to create effective, meaningful and manageable online group activities. Amongst the recommended best practices is to have “strategies in place to monitor interaction processes.” Just as important careful monitoring of student progress is to student achievement, is monitoring of student interactions within groups. Monitoring helps the teacher to be aware of the progress and difficulties the group is encountering, creating scaffolds and providing feedback as needed. In K-12 especially, effective communication and collaboration are skills that need to be modeled, explicitly taught and supported, and teachers can do so through CANVAS Groups.
Collaborations
CANVAS Collaborations is a feature in CANVAS that leverages collaborative technology. For example, students can collaborate by working on the same document, at the same time through Google Apps or Microsoft Office 365. Hundreds of other external apps also integrate well with CANVAS providing students with a wide selection of tool choice. However, for brevity, I will not go into detail regarding the many external apps, but rather focus on the fact that CANVAS Collaborations allows for external tool integration that foster collaboration.
Community
One of my favorite aspects of CANVAS is the Community. I was impressed by the number of active members and resources that are available. The CANVAS community is a place where educators, from novice to expert levels collaborate by asking and answering questions, as well as sharing content and ideas. This community is where I see the walls of the classroom disappear as one can learn from, and interact with a global community. According to Canvas Story CANVAS is used internationally since 2014. In 2019 “CANVAS reached more than 30 million global users. The online community surpassed 500,000 users in more than 70 countries.” Furthermore, the community is not limited to instructors, as it includes administrators, designers, parents and students.
Ratings
As of April of 2021, CANVAS has an overall rating in GetApp, of 4.5 stars, with 92% positive reviews and 97% recommendation.
GetApp includes over a thousand reviews of CANVAS, and provides a review summary of the pros and cons. The reviews include teachers/professors, parents and students’ viewpoints.
On the same date, the reviews at TrustRadius are 8.9 out of 10 points, of 166 reviews.
A time investment
The biggest drawback for implementing Groups, Discussions, and Collaboration in the classroom, is the time that it takes to learn, set up and implement these features. All the CANVAS resources and guides provide ample support and information on how to use CANVAS. Nevertheless, the time that it takes to get familiar with CANVAS and set up the classroom and resources is significant. In the article Why colleges and universities are adopting CANVAS, Etherington (2018) explains that “Although many colleges and universities choose to migrate from one LMS to another, the process is by no means easy. On average, the process takes at least two years.” While most CANVAS users appreciate its ability to support group work and collaboration, promote content creation for students and faculty, ease to upload writing assignments, and grading, app integration, and easy of system navigation, amongst other benefits, some of the main complaints reflect the user frustration as they navigate through all the informative guides needed and the time needed to learn the many CANVAS features. Similarly, CANVAS community has so many resources that it feels overwhelming to navigate through all the guides, videos, and resources.
Conclusion
In my specific content area, World Languages requires collaboration, as students are acquiring the language by engaging in communicative activities. Collaboration in pairs and in groups is essential to student learning in the World Language classroom. As students interact to learn and create meaningful authentic projects in the target language, careful monitoring of their progress is vital to student success. As I learn more about the pros and cons of CANVAS, I am positive that Groups, Discussions, Collaboration and the Community are valuable features that can offer a safe environment where students can enjoy an authentic and collaborative learning experience. Furthermore, teachers can collaborate in the creation of a master class that will then be shared, improved and used by many teachers. These master classes can also be shared for other teachers within the district or across the globe to use.
Resources
CANVAS Basic Guide https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Canvas-Basics-Guide/What-are-Collaborations/ta-p/61
Carter, R. (2018) Collaboration vs Communication in a Digital World https://www.uctoday.com/collaboration/collaboration-vs-communication-in-a-digital-world/
Colthorpe, Kay. (2020). Learning how to learn: Can embedded discussion Boards help first-year students discover new learning strategies? Advances in Psychology Education, 44(1), p. 1-8. https://eric.ed.gov/?q=discussion+boards&ff1=dtySince_2020&id=EJ1238627
Cotton, K. (1988) Monitoring Student Learning in the Classroom. School Improvement Research Series. Retrieved from https://educationnorthwest.org/sites/default/files/MonitoringStudentLearning.pdf
Davis, J (2019) Free Apps that integrate with VANVAS LMS. CANVAS community. https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/K12-Users/Free-Apps-that-Integrate-with-Canvas-LMS/ba-p/273208
Edutipia Make istance learning better https://www.edutopia.org/article/designing-your-lms-make-distance-learning-better
Etherington, C. (2018) Why colleges and universities are adopting CANVAS. learninginside.com
Gieson, L. V., (2018). My Top 5 freeish cool tools that integrate into CANVAS. Technology for Teaching and Learning https://wp.wpi.edu/atc-ttl/2018/01/31/my-top-5-free-ish-cool-tools-that-integrate-into-canvas/
Gokhale, A. (1995). Collaborative learning enhances critical thinking. Journal of Technology Education, 7(1) (p. 22-20. Retrieved from https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JTE/v7n1/pdf/gokhale.pdf
Gonzalez, J. The big list of Class Discussion Strategies. (2015) https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/speaking-listening-techniques/
Gonzalez, J. (2020). Distance Learning: A gently curated collection of resources for teachers. https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/distance-learning/
Juliani, A. (2014, January 23). 10 Commandments of Innovative Teaching – A.J. Juliani. Retrieved from http://ajjuliani.com/10-commandments-innovative-teaching/
Thoughts from the editors: teachers as co-learners in the digital age. (2012). Language Arts, Vol.89(4). Retrieved from http://www.ncte.org.ezproxy.spu.edu/journals/la/issues/v89-4
Requard, A. (2018, February 12). #ObserveMe: Improving Our Practice as Professionals. Retrieved from https://appsolutelyapril.com/2018/02/12/observeme-improving-our-practice-as-professionals/
