Don't Miss A Post!

Don't Miss A Post!

Monday, May 16, 2016

Closing out the Year with Canvas

The 2015-16 school year is quickly coming to a close. If you've been using Canvas this year, we've got GOOD NEWS.

There is very little a teacher must do to close out the year in Canvas, but it is advised that teachers review the End of Year Best Practices below.

Courses that were created by our Student Information System (Skyward) will conclude at the end of the grading term. Once a course is concluded, teachers will no longer be able to participate in the course. This includes modifying grades or accessing the assignment submissions, discussion threads, or other student interactions. A Read-Only version of the course will be available under Past Enrollments.

If you're looking ahead to 2016-17 already, rest assured that you will be able to copy or import content from concluded courses into your new courses for next year. We still advise backing up course content to a file or into Commons.

End of Year Best Practices (Optional, but recommended)

Click the links below to access the video tutorial for a desired process.

This document provides step-by-step instructions and the video tutorials for each of the processes below.


What are your Canvas-End-of-Year Questions?

We want to be able to answer all of your questions about how to wrap up our first year with Canvas. Please add questions in the comments below (if you're reading this on the blog), to our Social Media pages (Facebook or Twitter), or email your Instructional Technologist.

Be on the lookout for a FAQ post soon!



 Download the Canvas End of Year Best Practices document now!

Thursday, May 5, 2016

What is this Quarantine Email? How Do I Add Someone to the Safe Senders List?

We've received several questions about email lately. We'll try to tackle these questions here on the blog.

Today's topic is about the Quarantined Emails
  • What is it?
  • What happens when I click the links on the email?
  • How can I keep an email from being caught in the quarantine?

The video answers each of these questions and provides a few options for adding email addresses or domains to your Safe Senders list in Outlook and in your Office 365 online inbox.


Do you have other questions you'd like us to address? Add them in the comments here or email your district Instructional Technologist.

Tuesday, May 3, 2016

Turn an Email into an Appointment in Outlook 2016

EMS ISD Employees ... All district computers will be updated to Office 2016 this summer. In the meantime, you can download Office 2016 on up to 10 personal computers and devices with your Office 365 account. This Quick Tip works in Outlook 2016, but it also works in previous versions too!


There are a couple of easy-peasy ways to convert an email message into an appointment on your calendar. Check these out and see which one works best for you:

Click & Drag

  • In Outlook 2016 (and previous versions), click and drag an email message to the calendar icon in the lower left corner of your window
  • Adjust the times/dates
  • Click Save & Close

Move Tool
  • In the email message, click Move
  • Select Calendar
  • Adjust the times/dates
  • Click Save & Close

Want a visual? This short video demonstrates both ways to quickly convert an email to an calendar appointment.



Be watching for more Quick Tips!