Sticky notes on first page

Question

Is there a way to create a sticky note when I open up my course? There are student concerns and other items I'd like to keep track of and it would be great if there was a place to keep these together when I open the course.

James · Accepted Answer

@RussBartee

@Chris_Hofer mentioned the Notes column in the gradebook, but that is limited in what can be stored. It only allows for plain text and you're limited to 255 characters. It's only sticky in the sense that it is there when you open the gradebook, but not on other pages.

I probably underuse the notes page as I just put any preferred names (our institution doesn't allow students to edit their names) for the student. I have a group of dual credit students and I could add a note there about who is in that group (although this semester, 80% of the students in that class are dual credit so it would be quicker to list those who aren't).

There's not going to be anything sticky in the sense of always being on the home page of the course when you open the course. That's probably a good thing as what you describe is probably best hidden and not something that someone seeing your screen should have access to.

There are some external programs that allow you to keep notes on students and share those with other people who need to know or take action. If you need to communicate with other teachers or advisors, that might be the way to go.

If you want to keep it just for yourself, then you could put the notes into a Word or Google document. That's not sticky but you could bookmark it in your browser if you use an online storage such as One Drive or Google Drive. That's also not within Canvas and it may not be specific to a Canvas course.

There is a way to get most of what you want within Canvas. Create a content page in Canvas for the student notes. Call it whatever you want but don't publish the page. That way, only you can see it.

Then, if you are using modules as your homepage,  you can add a module item to take you to that content page with the student notes. Since it's not published, students won't be able to see it. You don't have to maintain one document across all of your classes, it can be specific to each class. That's about the best solution I can think of if the notes are just for you. They're kept with the class and they're easy to find.

My wife has used the unpublished module items trick for years to keep track of changes that she wants to make the next time she teaches a course. You don't want to go changing things in the middle of a semester, but you don't want to lose the great idea you had when you revisit the course in four months.