Clemson University Canvas Guide: A Comprehensive Overview

Clemson University utilizes Canvas as its primary course design, management, and delivery system. Canvas offers an intuitive user interface for both instructors and students, facilitating a focused learning experience. This guide provides an overview of Canvas, its core features, and supplementary resources available at Clemson University, including the integration of Library Research Guides and Open Educational Resources (OER). Furthermore, it explores innovative pedagogical approaches using Canvas, such as the Business Model Canvas (BMC) exercise.

Core Features of Canvas

Canvas offers a range of features designed to streamline course management and enhance the learning experience:

Gradebook: Canvas simplifies the process of keeping track of grades for class assessments.
Content Delivery: Instructors can create fully developed online courses with integrated teaching and learning tools.
Feedback and Evaluation: Canvas makes feedback, evaluation, and grading efficient and straightforward.
- Annotations can be added to submitted work, including highlighting, strikethroughs, and inline comments.
- Instructors can leave general feedback through video recordings, audio messages, or text.
Analytics: Canvas allows instructors to identify content mastery, student engagement trends, and learners who may need additional support.

Clemson Libraries Research Guides in Canvas

Clemson University Libraries provide subject-specific research guides that can be seamlessly integrated into Canvas courses. These guides offer access to relevant databases, journals, electronic journals, and books.

The "Library Resources" link in the course navigation menu provides students with direct access to these guides.
All Canvas courses with Library Resources enabled automatically display a guide tailored to the course's subject matter.
If the "Library Resources" link is missing, instructors can enable it in the course settings.

Open Educational Resources (OER) in Canvas

Open Educational Resources (OER) are freely available textbooks, interactive simulations and labs, instructional videos, and other materials designed for online use.

A dedicated Research Guide provides access to over 1,000 free resources for specialized, general education, and K-12 courses in various formats, including text, video, and interactive web simulations.
OER also includes access to free collections of images, historical literature, and primary sources.

Open Pedagogy and OER

OER is closely linked to open pedagogy, an educational approach that aims to motivate students by engaging them in the creation and publication of information on the web.

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Instead of traditional research papers, students can collaborate to write an OER textbook on the course subject.
This activity allows students to practice research skills, learn professional writing and editing, engage in peer review, understand copyright, and publish work that can be cited on their CVs.
Other publishing opportunities for students include creating wiki pages and blogs.

Innovative Pedagogical Approaches: The Business Model Canvas (BMC) Exercise

The Business Model Canvas (BMC) is a visual tool used by entrepreneurs to structure their business models. Clemson University has incorporated the BMC into innovative educational exercises.

Human-Sized Business Model Canvas Exercise

At the University Innovation Fellows Southeastern Regional Meetup, Bre and John led a human-sized Business Model Canvas exercise. This activity involved participant role-playing with a large canvas constructed on the venue floor.

The exercise was part of the University Innovation Fellows Southeastern Regional Meetup, hosted by Epicenter’s University Innovation Fellows in collaboration with Clemson University and Furman University on October 3, 2014, in Greenville, SC.
Participants took on personas of Greenville residents to explore the topic and a business idea they generated themselves, focusing on improving the pedestrian experience in downtown Greenville. This experience turned the BMC from a collection of descriptions on paper to a living map of people, connections, and voices.

Implementing the BMC Exercise

Bre and John created signs for each section of the canvas by printing each segment name, number, and questions.

The signs were affixed to thin plywood poles with padded tape to prevent splinters.
Name tags with imaginary community roles were distributed to participants.

Facilitating the BMC Exercise

David Orr, a lecturer in the MBA program at Clemson University and COO of Kiyatec, provided a review of the BMC. Bre and John then gave participants an overview of the exercise, including the process and the challenge: improving the pedestrian experience on Greenville’s Main Street.

Participants were assigned personas (such as Dog Walker, Shopper, City Planner, Mayor, 7-Year-Old Girl, etc.) and asked to interact with one another as their characters.
Students discussed how they interacted with businesses on Greenville’s Main Street.

The BMC Segments

Participants moved to the BMC segment rectangles on the floor, each marked with a sign.

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Students introduced themselves and discussed why they were in that particular segment.
The Customer segment identified problems and potential solutions, such as the need for a tourist kiosk to improve access to information about city activities.

Addressing BMC Questions

Bre and John guided the group through the BMC by posing questions related to different segments.

The goal was to work through the canvas and determine if Costs and Revenues aligned.

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