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Blackboard to Canvas Comparison Chart

The guide below lists the commonly used tools in Blackboard and their equivalents in Canvas. Please note that although some of the terminology may be the same, the tools may function differently in Canvas.

Blackboard to Canvas Comparison Chart
Blackboard Tool Canvas Tool What's the difference?
Announcements Announcements
  • Instructors can allow students to reply and "like" announcements
Assignments Assignments
  • When an assignment is created and published, it is added to the Assignment page, Syllabus, and Calendar (if a due date is set). When
    the assignment is edited/updated, all other links are automatically updated.
  • Instructors can limit the type of file allowed to be uploaded for assignments.
  • An individual assignment submission cannot be
    cleared. Instructors can add additional attempts for all students or edit an individual's grade to account for a revision.
Calendar Course Calendar
  • Automatically syncs with other tools such as Assignments, Syllabus and Grades.
  • Calendar items can be dragged and dropped within the calendar to change the assignment due date.
Content Collection Files
  • Repository for course files, assignments, syllabi, reading, etc.
  • Storage meter displays the remaining course quota.
  • Consider using Commons to store files that might be used for multiple people or departments.
Course Content Areas

Organizing Your Course Content


Modules

 

 


Pages

  • There are a few methods for organizing your course content in Canvas. 

  • Modules allow students to easily navigate online content with a consistent structure amongst all courses.
  • Modules can be hidden or revealed using accordion style filtering.

  • Pages in Canvas have history/versioning and revert/rollback.
Course Copy/Import Package Course Copy
  • When you perform a Course Copy, you can adjust events and due dates.
  • Course Copy logs will provide direct links to course items that had import issues.
Course Link Course Link
  • Only available within the Rich Content Editor.
Course List

Courses


Dashboard

  • The ability to “favorite” courses.
  • The ability to add a nickname, change card colors and add images to course cards.
  • Quick links on cards to common course tools.
Course Menu Navigation
  • Canvas does not allow you to create unique course navigation menu links nor rename existing menu links.
Discussion Boards / Forums / Threads Discussions
  • Discussions are more streamlined with fewer layers.
  • Discussions can be:
    • threaded or unthreaded.
    • pinned.
    • set to read only (Closed for Comments).
    • filtered for response by specific people.
    • assigned to Groups.
  • There’s no need to make a discussion thread per group.
  • Lack of anonymity and force moderation options.
  • Unable to set how many posts before entering the "Needs Grading" status.
Email Inbox
  • Accessible through the Global Navigation Menu
  • There is no designated email tool in Canvas.
  • Course communication can be managed through the Conversations inbox (Discussion responses, Assignment comments and feedback.)
  • Users can reply to Conversation notifications from their external email, and it will also come through to the Conversations inbox.
Evaluation New Analytics
  • Track average course grade for student submissions.
Folder Modules
  • Organize learning materials through Modules.
Grade Center Grades
  • Students can calculate hypothetical total scores using the What-If feature.
  • Curve grades for an assignment using a bell curve based on a manually entered average score.
  • Row colors alternate to improve readability.
  • Create late and missing policies to automatically apply grading to late and missed assignments.
  • In Canvas Grades, you cannot:
    • hide rows from the instructor.
    • manually create a column in the gradebook without creating an offline assignment.
    • create weighted, average, minimum/maximum, or total columns.
    • weight individual assignments (weighting is done by Assignment Group).
    • override the maximum point value of a column.
Groups Groups
  • Create Groups while setting up an Assignment or Discussion.
  • Assign a leader to each group.
  • Group assignments can be configured so that each student in the group needs to submit their own portion/version of the assignment.
  • Students can create their own groups (instructor can disable on a per course basis).
Group Discussion Group Discussion
  • Discussions can be assigned to all groups at once (via the main course Discussions).
  • Group Discussions are easier to create. It is no longer a separate tool; instead, it is a setting that can be enabled in the Discussion settings.
  • Easier to modify the description for all Group Discussions in the set.
Inline Grading SpeedGrader
  • Easier to comment, highlight, mark through text, or draw on a paper.
  • Allows for audio or video feedback.
Make Course Available Publish
  • All modules and the course need to be published.
My Grades Grades
  • Students can enter What-If scenarios to calculate hypothetical grades.
Needs Grading Dashboard
  • The sidebar contains a To Do list and other sections that help you know what assignments and events are coming up in all of your courses.
Notification Settings Notifications
  • Select how to receive different types of notifications.
  • You can select to be notified immediately, daily, weekly or not at all. Changes to these settings are immediate.
Rich Content Editor Rich Content Editor
  • Formatting is consistent between the editing window and final product.
  • Real-time spell checker
  • No emoticons
Rubrics Rubrics
  • Provide a variety of rating scales
  • Can pull in "Outcomes" as a criteria
Self and Peer Assessments Assignments
  • Peer reviews are built into assignments and can be enabled on the fly.
  • No self-evaluation options
Test, Surveys and Pools Classic Quizzes and Question Banks
  • Surveys can be worth points.
  • Options include:
    • filter quiz takers based on IP.
    • add extra credit "Fudge Points" to a student submission directly from SpeedGrader
    • assign Quizzes to individual students from the edit Quiz menu.
    • bookmark Quiz Banks 
  • Select a Quiz Type:
    • Graded Quizzes
    • Practice Quizzes
    • Graded Surveys
    • Ungraded Surveys
  • Options do not include:
    • The following question types:
        • Quiz Bowl
        • Jumbled sentence
        • Likert scale
        • Ordering
    • Auto-Submit ON/OFF toggle (Auto-Submit is always on for a timed test).
    • ability to label multiple choice questions (e.g., abc, 123),
    • ability to choose between vertical or horizontal orientation.
    • designated checkbox to exclude Quizzes from the Grade Center calculations.
Users People
  • Provides a concise list of recent messages.
  • An instructor can view various pieces of data about students:
    • Student grades
    • Interactions reports
    • Access reports
    • New analytics
    • Missing/late assignments
    • Total and last activity
    • Activity compared to the rest of the class
  • Instructors can no longer see a user’s email; In Canvas, you can only see NetID and send messages via the Canvas message tool.

 

Blackboard to Canvas Workarounds
Blackboard Tool Options in Canvas
(No Direct Equivalent)
Workaround
Blogs Adjust settings in Discussions

There is no Blog tool in Canvas. Instead, you can adjust the settings in Discussions.

Journals Discussion board or text submission assignment

There is no Journal tool in Canvas. Instead use the discussion board or create a text submission assignment.

Manual Grade Column No submission setting in Assignments

There is no option to create a manual grade column in the Canvas Grade Book. Instead, create a new assignment, then set the Submission Type in settings to No Submission.

Wikis Pages with adjusted editing permissions

There is no Wiki tool in Canvas. While it's not a direct equivalent, you can change the permissions in Page settings to allow students to edit.

No grade can be set for Pages, and there is no designated comment section for users to provide feedback on individual pages.