Simplify Your Navigation
By default, Canvas adds several extra menu items to your course that you are probably not using that make it difficult for students to find the resources that you are using. Some of these menu items (those with an *) only show up for students when they have content, but other menu items (e.g. Attendance, Collaboration, Chat) show up whether you are using them or not.
Why Remove the Extra Menu Items?
Essentially, it is easier to find what you are looking for when there are fewer options to select from. In addition, providing links to your main navigation that is not used in the course can confuse students trying to navigate your course content.
What to Remove and How to Remove It
You can remove those extra, unnecessary menu items to make your course more usable and help students more easily get to your content every time they log in to your course. When considering which items to keep in your course and which to remove, we recommend that you keep these essential tools:
- Announcements
- Syllabus
- Assignments
- Discussions
- Grades
- Modules
- People
- Quizzes
You are welcome to use any other menu items that you need - just remember to get rid of any menu items that you are not using.
The Files Section
We recommend hiding the Files section of the course and instead linking to files directly from Canvas pages
Additional Tips & Resources:
- You can view your course as your students see it
. - You can view more information on managing your course navigation menu items
from the Canvas documentation. - Consider placing the most important menu items at the top of your navigation!