Asynchronous Communication
Effective and timely asynchronous communication Links to an external site. is a big part of online learning. Many students enroll in online and hybrid classes specifically because they need the flexibility in their schedule due to work or family responsibilities. Here are some options for asynchronous communication in Canvas and a few of our thoughts on the matter.
Read through these descriptions and consider using them when appropriate.
Email is one of the simplest asynchronous tools to use. All students and faculty have a school-provided email account and most people will be familiar with this tool coming into the program. Email allows you to send and receive messages on your schedule, organize messages into folders for archive and future reference, and send and receive file attachments.
Canvas Conversations
Conversations is Canvas's global messaging system. It's similar to email, but you can easily send messages to course members without knowing their email addresses. Students are notified based on their settings and can respond directly in Canvas as well.
Discussion forums
Discussions are a way to have an asynchronous dialogue with multiple class members contributing. The discussion tool groups responses in a way that you can tell who is responding to whom in "threads" and users can specify who they are responding to. Discussions in Canvas can be graded as assignments to enhance the understanding of course concepts. Discussions are most effective when the sharing of information between students is valuable to their learning, but can simply be used as a communication tool for asking questions or discussing topics with peers
Piazza
Piazza is a third-party LTI available for use in your course that is a wiki-style Q & A tool. This means students can ask questions, anonymous or not, that can then be answered by their peers or by the instructor. However, instead of collecting several answers from peers, Piazza allows students to edit the previous answer to make it more correct, allowing the student-supplied answer to evolve and improve over time. Instructors can also leave their own answer or endorse the student answer as correct. This tool reduces student emails asking questions and the amount of time it takes for students to get quality responses.
We highly recommend using this tool as a venue for students to ask general questions about a course, as well as a tool for instructors to provide course announcements. For more information check out their website Links to an external site. or try it out for yourself by clicking on the Piazza link in the course navigation on the left.
Chat
Chat is not typically used as an asynchronous tool, but in Canvas chat messages are persistent, meaning you could leave a message and come back later to see if there are any responses. However, this is not a recommended use for this tool.
Click "mark as done" in the top corner when complete, and then "next" below to continue to your assignment.