Guidance for Planning an Inclusive Teaching Course in Canvas

Key information

Make sure key information is available in the Canvas course or can be accessed from the course.

• Expectations - clear expectations of student engagement / participation and standards of work (including in different teaching scenarios – e.g. tutorials) are provided (see section 3). 
• Course handbook.

• Course outline.
• Reading lists (see section 5).
• Course materials.
• Course schedule.
• Events / Important dates (see section 2).

Tools and activities

Review how you intend to use various tools and activities and explain them to students. These include:

• Dates in Canvas calendar
• Assignments
• Announcements

• Teams
• Panopto recordings summar

Communication

Review and explain how you intend to communicate with students. For example:

• How students should contact staff online

• Email.
• Canvas discussions.
• Teams chat.
• Will you use Announcements in Canvas or send mass emails?
• Are expectations set around response times?

Modules

The modules tool (Links to an external site.) is used to ‘chunk’ content into manageable pieces (e.g., organised by units, chapters, topics or weeks). 

• Label modules in a consistent and descriptive way throughout the course (e.g., name the module according to topic or week; use a numeric prefix to identify items that belong within a particular module, e.g., “1.4 Reading List” is the fourth item in week 1).
• Use titles that make sense to students at a glance, providing them with the information needed to know what the resource or activity is without opening it.

Navigation

Keep navigation clear and consistent through the course. Explicit and meaningful headings and short introductions with bullet points on each page inform students’ navigation decisions.

Calendar events

Add important dates, due dates and / or timetables to the Canvas calendar (Links to an external site.) (or alternative).

The Calendar Import Tool lets you import events in bulk into the Canvas calendar. 

Consistency

Provide a consistent student experience across related Canvas courses – in how they are arranged and where items are located.

Learning Environment

Establish a learning environment in Canvas that is inclusive for all students. Key principles of inclusive teachingLinks to an external site.. 

Expectations

Outline expectations of the course to provide a guide for students when reviewing materials and preparing for assessments. It should be clear what students will learn and how they will be expected to show what they have learned.

• Guidance on writing effective learning outcomesLinks to an external site. is available on the Centre for Teaching and Learning website.
• The learning activities and assessments are designed to support students to achieve these learning outcomes.

Feedback to students

Provide timely and consistent feedback. Oxford Teaching Ideas include information on Inclusive feedbackLinks to an external site..

• Tools for providing feedback in Canvas include: SpeedGrader (Links to an external site.) and peer review assignments (Links to an external site.). 
• There is also an Oxford Teaching Idea on peer feedbackLinks to an external site..

Feedback from students

Give students the opportunity to feed back on their experience. 

This is a way to find out from your students how teaching is or is not helping them learn and so take a targeted approach to making changes to your teaching practice. An Introduction to Evaluating Your TeachingLinks to an external site. is available.

Variety

Provide a range of activities in the Canvas course to engage students (e.g., quizzes, discussions, polls, opportunities for collaboration outside of teaching events etc.). 

Use different formats for delivering content (e.g., books, journal articles, websites, diagrams, podcasts, animations etc.).

Study Skills

Provide links to further study and academic skills resources. For example, Study skills and training | University of OxfordLinks to an external site..

Handouts

Provide handouts summarising the main points of the lecture/session where appropriate.

Make sure that students can easily access a detailed and up to date information about assessment:

• Assignment timetable – provide details of the assignment timetable for the term at the start. Ideally, use the Canvas calendar.
• Assessment methods –how will learning be assessed (both exams and formative assessment).
• Explicit assessment criteria:

• • Clear descriptions of the required tasks.
  • Clear instructions on deadlines. 
  • Details on how the assignments should be submitted (link to the e-assessment tool (e.g., Inspera) where relevant).  

• Links to past papers.

Preferably, create reading lists using ORLOLinks to an external site. and embed them in the Canvas modules list.

The Designing effective reading listsLinks to an external site. resource provides questions to consider when preparing reading lists.

List structure

• Distinguish between core and additional readings for the course (essential, recommended, and further readings).
• Group by topic– if reading lists cover a variety of topics, consider grouping the list according to these.
• Timetable reading – if you plan to focus on a particular text or topic each week or teaching session, consider making this explicit. For example, by using headings such as ‘Week 1 Reading’.

A clear structure will help students to prioritise their course reading schedule and make appropriate use of resources.

Availability of readings

• Check SOLOLinks to an external site. to find all items available within the libraries, including books, journals, CD-ROMs, DVDs. Electronic and print resources in SOLO can be added to ORLO lists to provide direct access or live library availability.
• Make the reading list available in advance (at least a week). Note: It can take at least six weeks for students to receive texts in alternative formats through the Accessible Resources UnitLinks to an external site..

ORLO tips

• In ORLO reading importance tags and sections help to structure reading lists. 
• If using ORLO, make sure to embed the most up-to-date version of the ORLO list in CanvasLinks to an external site..
• Note: another function within ORLO is the ability to export a PDF copy of a published ORLO list, with links included, from student view.
• Oxford Reading Lists Online resources: ORLO (Oxford Reading Lists Online): Guides to using Canvas at Oxford, Getting started - Oxford Reading Lists Online (ORLO) - Oxford LibGuides at Oxford UniversityLinks to an external site., Bodleian Libraries: Reading ListsLinks to an external site.. 

An example of a reading list that has a good structure, effective use of reading importance and a nice range of items is OII_MSc_SDS_Foundations of Social Data Science_MT (Links to an external site.).

Digital versions of learning/teaching materials

Provide links to teaching materials in advance of the lecture/class/lab/tutorial. At least 48 hours and ideally a week in advance. 

Ensure students know any work they need to undertake / complete before the session. 

The Bodleian Library provides a digitisation serviceLinks to an external site..

Accessible recordings

Provide access to recordings of lecturesLinks to an external site. or equivalent materials where appropriate in line with University policies. 

Ensure that recordings have:

• Descriptive names that make it clear what lecture they belong to
• Clear organisation (either in folders)
• Automatically generated captions (this is enabled by default in Panopto)
• Manually edited captions where necessary 

Also consider:

• Providing teaching session slides separately
• Creating bullet point summaries of key points discussed in videos
• Providing text transcript of audio or video files provided (where possible and feasible).

See Readability Principles for More Productive and Actionable Documents and Presentation.docx (Links to an external site.) for more details.

Ease of reading and understanding

Pay attention to how easy it is to quickly read documents and pages you create. Think about:

• What students need to know first.
• What documents they are likely to come back to many times.
• How quickly can they find relevant information.

Structure

• Put important things first, leave background or welcome statements to linked pages.
• Break document into multiple sections marked by section headings
• Break up lists into bullet points.
• Bold key phrases / facts in long paragraphs to improve discovery. 

Formatting

• Use a large font.
• Keep lines short.
• Avoid ALL CAPS, italics, and large blocks of centred text. 

Language

• Keep short sentences (under 20 words).
• Use short paragraphs to improve scannability.
• Address the reader rather than talk about them.

Use the Ally Course Accessibility Report to review digital accessibility issues of pages and documents uploaded to the course. 

Note: This will not check accessibility of readings linked to through ORLO. However, the Bodleian digitisation service ensures that ORLO scans are OCR searchable.

Not all the issues will be important to all your students and may not require immediate action.

See detailed guide on Five most common accessibility issues and how to prevent them.docx (Links to an external site.). 

• Oxford Canvas Guidance

  • Manage Courses (Rollover)
  • Using Canvas at Oxford
  • Teams
  • Panopto
  • Calendar Import Tool
  • ORLO (Oxford Reading Lists Online)
  • Guides to using Canvas at Oxford

• Canvas Guidance

  • Modules tool (Links to an external site.)
  • Canvas calendar (Links to an external site.)
  • SpeedGrader (Links to an external site.)
  • Peer review assignments (Links to an external site.)

• Canvas courses

  • An introduction to Inclusive Teaching at Oxford
  • Flexible Inclusive Teaching
  • An Introduction to Tutorial Teaching at Oxford (Humanities and Social Sciences)
  • An Introduction to Tutorial Teaching at Oxford (Sciences)

• Centre for Teaching and Learning website

  • Flexible and Inclusive TeachingLinks to an external site.
  • AccessibilityLinks to an external site.
  • Key principles of inclusive teachingLinks to an external site.
  • Guidance on writing effective learning outcomesLinks to an external site.
  • Inclusive feedbackLinks to an external site.
  • Peer feedbackLinks to an external site.
  • Introduction to Evaluating Your TeachingLinks to an external site.
  • Designing effective reading listsLinks to an external site.
  • Recordings of lecturesLinks to an external site.

• University website

  • Study skills and trainingLinks to an external site.

• Bodleian Libraries website

  • ORLOLinks to an external site.
  • SOLOLinks to an external site.
  • Accessible Resources UnitLinks to an external site.
  • ORLO list in CanvasLinks to an external site.
  • Getting started - Oxford Reading Lists Online (ORLO) - Oxford LibGuides at Oxford UniversityLinks to an external site.
  • Bodleian Libraries: Reading ListsLinks to an external site.
  • OII_MSc_SDS_Foundations of Social Data Science_MT (Links to an external site.)
  • Bodleian digitisation serviceLinks to an external site.

• Other

  • Readability Principles for More Productive and Actionable Documents and Presentation.docx (Links to an external site.)
  • Five most common accessibility issues and how to prevent them.docx (Links to an external site.)