CANVAS Erfahrungen

Vorteile

There are so many great things about Canvas LMS. It's about fit of course, so I would never use it for corporate L&D... but as an academic LMS, it ranks at the top. I love the community forums (you can find help for literally anything), and the numerous tools that are 1) either provided by Canvas, or, 2) integrate nicely with Canvas.

I also like the ease of use. It might seem overwhelming at first, but learning to build and administer courses on Canvas becomes easier by the day. So at first it may seem tough, but stick with it! It gets much easier - quickly!

Nachteile

In order to upgrade the look and feel of it, without hiring a team of graphic designers, you need to use design service that integrates with Canvas.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

Moodle

Gründe für den Wechsel zu CANVAS

I started using Canvas as a student! Way back. When I became an eLearning developer, I already had the familiarity of it from university :)

Vorteile

With the rise of Coronavirus and online options for college classes, Canvas has been a staple tool for students taking online classes and even with online assignments. Canvas, similar to Google Classroom, is a program that allows teachers to assign work through the web instead of wasting time printing and wasting paper. It allows students to be notified of when assignments are due and even allows them to take quizzes and test online. With most of the world being forced to do everything digitally Canvas allows access to Zoom through ConferNow which allows for teachers to schedule lectures and meetings. Canvas also allows you to message other students if needed. Without Canvas, school online would be incredibly difficult, and although Google Classroom is a solid option for courses in elementary school through high school, Canvas has more features such as users being able to directly embed LTIs such as Flipgrid.

Nachteile

Although Canvas is better than Google Classroom in terms of the number of features, Google Classroom's interface is simpler and easier to understand than Canvas's. Google Classroom, being a Google program, also makes it slightly easier to turn in assignments using Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, etc. Canvas's user system can also use some work as well. Canvas may have the ability to allow you to see other students but it's obscure. There's no way to search for other people unless they're in your class and most people don't even know of the profile feature. Personally, I don't believe there are many problems with Canvas except that they should redo its design because to me it seems a bit bland and that they should make its interface a bit more simpler since it can be confusing to navigate through.

Vorteile

What I like the most about this software is the features because it's very useful in online learning it's also very easy to use and it develops very well.

Nachteile

There are some minor issues but it's definitely easy to counter and I think it's not a problem at all because this software is really good.

Vorteile

I had used this software form 2019 to 2021 and most of my uni assesment and project had to be downloaded and uploaded to this software for the porrfessors to review and correct

Nachteile

This software need a soild concetion to the internet so if a building wifi is starting to fail this is one of the software that can not work at a cirtical time

Vorteile

I like canvas because it is easy to use. anybody could use canvas without any help. It also lets you check your grades/progress with ease.

Nachteile

I do not like the fact that in canvas it is hard to get ahold of your teacher/professor and it takes a day for the message to reach them. also grades take a couple of days to update.

Vorteile

I like their notification system because I get alerted right away when results, announcements or new assignments are posted.

Nachteile

Sometimes, the students grades section doesn't always show the most updated results.

Vorteile

Canvas is easy to use, accessible and provides all the learning tools I need to complete my online degree.

Nachteile

Canvas is perfect for me. I absolutely love it and find no challenges using it.

Vorteile

What I like most about Canvas is the user friendly interface. My Canvas is divided by courses and then by modules, assignments, and other aspects of the course within the course. This interface helps me stay organized and on top of everything.

Nachteile

I do not have any complaints about this software.

Vorteile

How decluttered everything is. There are clear overviews of documents, grades, courses, etc. And it is so easy to navigate and looks amazing. It’s a no-nonsense platform.

Nachteile

Personally, there isn’t much I can say about Canvas that I don’t like. Perhaps the thing I like the least is that it is not really a video platform. You can upload videos, however the functionalities there are limited.

Vorteile

Canvas is extremely easy to use, very user friendly.

Nachteile

The only thing that I did not like about Canvas is the grading feature, you can plug in any grade to see what the overall score would be?

Vorteile

Most useful feature is revisiting the previous courses and going through the material that was covered in those courses. Typically, in other similar software, this is disabled after a certain period of time but Canvas keeps this feature open. The product is definitely easy to use as apart from showing the current courses, it also displays the upcoming deadlines and announcements that comes in very handy as soon as a user logs into the system and navigates to the home screen

Nachteile

The worst thing about this product in a lack of search functionality. Manually going through the complete list of options/courses/documents or whatever is present in the Canvas to find one required element is time-intensive process. A search feature would have been really useful in quickly searching what we are looking for.

Vorteile

As a returning student attaining an MBA through an online program at a state university, I spent the first several semesters suffering through Blackboard. Like CANVAS, Blackboard is a learning management system used by today's higher education institutions. However, I always found it to be difficult to navigate and challenging to use. Recently, my university switched to CANVAS. I was nervous at first because, while I was no fan of Blackboard, I feared CANVAS might be worse. Thankfully I was completely wrong. CANVAS features a clean dashboard where all of your courses, assignments, grades, discussion boards, and other online learning tools can easily be accessed. It's extremely user-friendly and I had become a skilled CANVAS user in under an hour. I used to dread accessing Blackboard, but now I welcome accessing CANVAS instead.

Nachteile

There is literally nothing to dislike about CANVAS. Even those new to online learning will find it simple to use and extremely flexible.

Vorteile

Canvas is useful because I can see all of my coursework on one platform that is simple to use. I can organize my courses on the home page as I like, and when I click on the course, I can see modules, assignments, and tests attached to the course. Documents load very easily on Canvas, and I like being able to "preview" documents posted before downloading them.

Nachteile

I have two complaints about the Canvas software. First of all, the mobile version does not work well. I never downloaded the Canvas app, but did try to go on the website on my phone. The text was so small and the menus on the left side of the screen did not load well, so I could never use my phone to get on Canvas without the app. My other complaint with the software is that whenever anything was graded for a course, even if it was an older assignment, I'd get a notification. Perhaps this is just the settings set by the instructor and not Canvas itself, however.

Vorteile

1) Gives inward correspondence, not needing an external message or email framework.

2) Incorporates a file sharing structure for informative materials inside the framework.

3) Gives an evaluating stage that is distinguishable by students and instructors.

Nachteile

Record names used to be shortened - however that is fixed at this point.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

Google Classroom

Warum CANVAS gewählt wurde

Canvas takes the better part of the Google Classroom and consolidates them to work pretty flawlessly - reviewing, tasks, participation, record/document sharing - all coordinated into one stage. Moreover, the interior correspondence include makes communication between the student and instructors simple to track and follow. That is an incredible expansion to the general bundle.

Zuvor genutzte Software

Google Classroom

Vorteile

This LMS has become the hub of my classroom. It holds both students and teachers accountable with complete tracking of assignments.

Nachteile

It could have better integration with our SIS (FACTS), but I think this is more of an issue with FACTS.

In Betracht gezogene Alternativen

Blackboard Learn und Schoology

Zuvor genutzte Software

Blackboard Learn und Schoology

Gründe für den Wechsel zu CANVAS

Schoology was a close second, mainly because of their workload planning, but the overall interface and the fact the many of our students will see Canvas when they go to college, it was the clear choice.

Vorteile

I've been a full-time student for the past 10 years and all the institutions that I've been attending have used canvas to post grades and make announcements. I have never had any complaints about the online website. It is easy to customize the main page to see exactly which courses you are in and it gives you the ability to arrange them in the order that you see fit, with your most important classes place in the more visible areas of the website. On the right side of the page there is an announcement bar where updates from your professors are easily seen and any new grades that have been posted are showing as well. Canvas also gives the professors the ability to organize students into groups for certain projects and also too give quizzes and tests. Professors also can upload PowerPoints, handouts, and other sources of material, which are easily downloaded through the website which automatically packs all the files, if multiple, into a zip file for your convenience. Overall, I've had a good experience with canvas and I would recommend it to institutions that are looking for a reliable, convenient way to communicate to students and facilitate courses online.

Nachteile

I don't really have any negative things to say about the software itself. The only issues that I have had are with the app, which I have used both on Android and Apple devices. When clicking on pop-up notifications for new grades being posted or sometimes other announcements, the app opens but it does not take you to the desired notification. When faced with a blank screen, you need to restart the app and manually go to where the notification was trying to direct you.

Vorteile

1) Easy to use as a teacher. Once you get the schema of how the software works and accept its ways and limitations, then you can really use it to your advantage within that framework.
2) Integration with other softwares. Canvas integrates with many other LTI providers, but everyone is slightly different, so you need to be willing to pay the price to learn how to integrate things carefully.
3) Speedgrader is nice. I've seen better ones in other LMSs, but Canvas Spreedgrader is pretty good.
4) Training and support. You can find, if you search carefully, tons of training resources for Canvas.

Nachteile

1) It's easy to create things that clutter your course, system almost without knowing.
2) The assessment engine is quite limited. The new quiz engine is still too buggy to use and has been way overdue.
3) I hate that there is not an autosave feature, specially when building quizzes. More than once, I accidentally save the quiz without saving the individual question and loose a ton of work.
4) It's almost impossible to find your grades across multiple courses. You have to go to each course individually and click several places at that.

Vorteile

I have used canvas at both my previous college and my current one which I transferred to, for both classes which were taken entirely on the platform (online classes) and classes where it was used as an aid. The ability to see an up to date schedule for your classes, contact instructors, revisit old modules, submit assignments online, view and respond to instructor feedback... It's completely changed the game. It's become an intrinsic part of my routine to check canvas everyday. You can also customize what alerts you want to see, so if your instructor gives you feedback or sends an alert out you can get an email straight away.

The app is also fantastic and very convenient!

If you're an instructor and you don't use canvas, I worry that I won't be able to see important changes in time. Plus, feedback is relegated to the old fashioned, penciled in way of the early 2000s. We're better than that now, in no small part due to Canvas, which has genuinely revolutionized the medium learning takes.

Nachteile

There was one brief time this year where they pushed an update that made it so one of my instructors would see some error message when they clicked on my file submission, even though they were able to successfully download the file. They patched that quickly!

Overall, it turns of lasting cons, canvas has tried very hard to become irreplaceable, and they've succeeded. My only problem is when instructors aren't tech oriented, and so don't understand how to set up a course shell, but that's not canvas' fault.

Vorteile

When Canvas became our LMS for e-learning I was delighted. Having a secure, self-contained platform was a game-changer for teachers and students. Using SSO (single sign on) enabled users to access their classes easily and without fail. The course customization and integration with other tools (OneNote, Google, Flipgrid, Formative, etc.) made advanced users look like wizards of course design. The calendar feature which allows students to track and plan for assignments empowers learners.

Canvas was ahead of the curve when it comes to individual feedback. Their voice or video comment feature has been personalizing the virtual classroom for years. Canvas is great for Professional Develpment especially with the discussion feature. Learners can respond to and interact with one another asynchronously and this authentic interaction benefits students and teachers alike.

Nachteile

There were times when the customization features were not enough in Canvas. The platform itself is not visually appealing at first. The user has to carefully desing the course, beginning with the end in mind, to make it visually appearing and navigable for the learner.

Additionally, it may just have been our district instance but the integration with PowerSchool gradebook was both a plus and a minus. Teachers loved that interaction as it saved so much time grading. When that interaction had glitches it was a nightmare and sometimes difficult to solve or to find the root cause. This was often the fault of browser updates or software bugs, not Canvas.

Vorteile

We use the Free for Teacher edition. When it comes to setting up courses, having assignments, files, students, deadlines, and grades set up, it's pretty simple. Not a lot of trouble getting things put together. You can integrate videos, there's a conference capability called Big Blue Button that allows all the members of the course to video in with each other and you can share screen and everything. It has been a big help allowing our students to have a portal to do their assignments, and connect with everyone in the class.

Nachteile

One of the nuances to Canvas that is difficult is limiting what teachers can see. By that I mean we have two different types of courses that we run.

One is an individual cohort of a few students and a director. The only way to make these closed down to just these members is to create a duplicate of the course and put those members in. Not a terrible thing, but then the courses start to stack up with all the different cohorts you have going. Plus, there's not really a way to have any updates filter down into all the same semester courses. So if we want to make an update on Semester 1, we have to go into each individual course and update it. There's also no way to update deadlines when you copy a course. So I have to change every assignment's due date so it fits in the new semester's timeline.

The other kind of course that we have is an open course that anyone can jump into, and then we assign a TA to grade certain students. The problem with this is that there's no way to limit the TA's view of who is in the course. So it shows them that there are dozens of students' work that needs to be graded in their To-Do List and makes it difficult for them to know when their assigned students have actually submitted anything. Haven't been able to find a work around for this yet.

Vorteile

Canvas is a software that I have been using for multiple years now, having used it originally in school, and now in college at Georgetown University while also making use of the software's organizational benefits as an Intern at EY. There are a few aspects of this program that stand out to me as being significantly beneficial. Firstly, Canvas, as a platform, is used for connecting users in an organization (class, work project, team, etc.) under one platform. The administrator (boss, professor, team leader) can then publish documents, quizzes, links, and other files so that its users can all view them, without the need for the administrator to send these files to each user individually. Perhaps the largest pro of a software like Canvas is that, on the same platform where files are published and shared with others, users can also engage in blog posts, discussions, Zoom conferences, and more features; all of which allow them to communicate with and learn from each other while also becoming familiar with any material posted by their boss, team leader, or professor. This synergy is what makes canvas special and unique; it is a one-stop-shop for individuals in an organization to parttake in multiple means of learning, all in the same location.

Nachteile

Despite being a phenomenal software platform, perhaps one of its downfalls is that, when using CANVAS in school or in college, the dashboard can get relatively messy. When enrolled in many different classes across different semesters, older classes tend to stay on your dashboard and this can make it difficult to keep your new classes a priority at first glance. While this is easy to edit in your Canvas settings, I personally believe this should be something that the user can edit from the homepage. In addition, it would be a large plus to the aspect of organization if users could customize the menu bar on the left side of the website, to only show the tabs they want to see for each class or project (files, modules, pages, discussions, announcements, grades, etc.)

Vorteile

I've been using Canvas as an instructor at a university for the past 7+ years. The best thing about Canvas is that it's better organized than Moodle, which I've also used. I encountered Canvas when I came to work at my university. Before I started my job I was only familiar with Moodle, which I thought was an awful ed-tech application. I found Canvas to have a better interface, and was easier to navigate as a user. As an instructor, there are all kinds of features that you can use to set up a class, foster engagement, track student progress and assess completion of assignments. You can set up discussions, assign students to groups and even enable them to meet virtually. Canvas also works well for asynchronous learning in that you can create a course that is self-paced and students can step through each assignment on their own time.

Nachteile

The biggest challenge with Canvas is that it's not easy to use, unless you've been trained and know what you're doing. I had to learn Canvas completely on my own and it was a bit of a nightmare, even for someone like me who is very comfortable with technology. It's not entirely intuitive, especially when you're building a course from scratch. It's basically a website and you have to learn how to link pages, websites, documents, etc. You don't need to know how to code or use HTML, but it's still very painstaking to set up a class, even if you copy a previous class from year to year and just need to update it. The grading feature was also "updated" and it's more annoying now and less easy to use. The one big drawback though is the interface in that it's not all that graphical. You have to learn work arounds to make the interface more appealing to students. It's still better than Moodle! But still, it would be great if they could make it more like a real graphical website and less like a Word document on a website.

Vorteile

After my university switched over to Canvas as the preferred course management software, I was happy to finally have a user-friendly interface to work with. The menu is not cluttered and all tabs and icons are easy to find. One of the main advantages of Canvas is the ability to easily sync a school email account and get live notifications when items and assignments are posted.

Professors can also setup calendars that help remind students of exam, project, and homework due dates. Students can also setup discussions or threads within their respective courses, which is useful when a lot of students have a similar question. Saves the professor time from having to answer 50 emails about the same question.

Nachteile

The notification system, both as a student and professor, is not the most efficient system. Canvas is meant to have a built-in emailing program. This creates a lot of confusion when students send messages via Canvas (which is linked to a school email account) and separately send messages directly from their school email. I've encountered times where it was not clear how to send a message directly to particular member of the course, and ended up emailing the entire class by accident.

Professors often alternate between general email notifications and "Dashboard" notifications within Canvas. It makes it confusing for students as to where exactly to look for course related information. I find this lack of streamlining for notifications to be the biggest drawback.

Vorteile

Canvas provides several features that allow students like me with a full 18 credit load to organize, access grades and assignments and keep track of the class process. One of my favorite and most used tool provided by Canvas has been the grade calculator tool; this tool allowed me to estimate my final grade in the class to measure the grade I had to obtain in the final exam to achieve a competitive average. Moreover, the software does a great job at notifying the due date for each assignment and also, letting you know when the professor posted the grade for the exams. Another one of my favorite features is the side bar with all the updates on gradebooks, notification and direct messages that allowed me to access all the features in a fast manner.

Nachteile

One of the features that needs improvement is the email notification tool. This tool sent large amount of double notifications anytime there was an update to the gradebook. Also, some browsers were not compatible with the Canvas software and would automatically cause troubleshooting of the different features offered by the software.

Vorteile

The ease of being able to attend my lectures and webinars online, from anywhere with a wifi connection, makes it very attractive. I can submit online with ease and allowing me to store all my information in a single place is a big plus. My interaction with my lecturers has been seamless and offers a range of great features. Allowing me to store all the information on the Canvas platform, which makes my work a lot easier and saves time.

Nachteile

Not the most user friendly and I struggled to navigate on the platform. Video quality isnt the best at times(no, my wifi connection was just fine) but having said that , i would still recommend Canvas from my personal experience of having used it over a few years.