Embedded Files
Mioy T. Huynh
Starting in Summer 2024, I decided to redesign my entire course page. I've always felt that design is integral to an effective learning experience. Increasingly, a student's first interaction with a course is through the learning management system (LMS).
Guideposts
Guideposts
When designing the homepage for the course, I wanted:
Simplicity of options
Intuitive, student-centered navigation
Dynamic and flexible display of content
You can use the Whimsical presented embedded below to explore the different components of a Canvas course homepage.
Different Components
Different Components
The left-hand side navigation menu is substantially simplified to reduce options.
The most frequently used items are permanently displayed on the homepage as tiles beneath the banner image.
All of the course content, compiled into weekly modules, are display on the homepage.
The content for the current week is listed as "active" and highlighted for the student.
At the bottom, the currently active module's content is displayed.
The dynamic display of the current module's content only works on a computer. Users on a phone or table will simply not see this section.
If two modules are marked active, then both modules will display.
If no modules are marked as active, then nothing will display.
Content Pages
Content Pages
The screenshot on the right shows an example of a student-facing content page. It is structured with:
A brief introduction at the top.
A tabbed collection of videos for students to watch.
In some instances, I have the "active" video tab set to change as we progress through the content.
In other cases, I set the "active" video tab to highlight a particularly helpful tutorial for the week (this is the example shown).
The bottom of these pages displays the current course module (identical to the module displayed on the homepage screenshot shown above).
Interactive Pages
Interactive Pages
The animated screenshot on the left shows an example of a student-facing content page featuring interactive features (in order of appearance):
flashcards for students to reveal tips
short "quick-check" questions related to video tutorials
drag-and-drop style practice
digital flashcards for extra practice where students can mark whether they got each correct or incorrect
None of these activities are graded or recorded, so students can interact with them as they see fit.
What if I don't want weekly modules?
What if I don't want weekly modules?
Here's another homepage I designed using similar methods.
The big difference between this homepage and the prior (above) one is that the content for this course was displayed in units instead of weeks of content.
The display is still dynamic and still set to only show the current, or active, unit(s) for the student.
Regardless of whether modules are set up in "time blocks" or "content blocks," the design is easily adapted to facilitate student navigation of the course LMS.
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