Canvas Baseline Practices
A long-standing tension identified through feedback is that students want consistency within their courses.
Building on the 2016 ‘Canvas Minimum Presence’ document, the University has created the Canvas Baseline Practices to enable a user-friendly, equitable and inclusive online experience. The drivers for this work include:
- UoA student feedback, international research, and good practices from peer institutions.1
- Aligning the use of Canvas for learning, teaching and assessment with the strategic goals of Taumata Teitei, and the Curriculum Framework Transformation project.
- Ensuring we meet the accessibility requirements identified in the Disability Action Plan.
Alan Shaker, 2023 President of the Auckland University Student Association introduces the Canvas Baseline Practices.
What are the Canvas Baseline Practices?
The Baselines are intended to lift standards in course design and are underpinned by the principles of Universal Design for Learning2 and accessibility standards, and are informed by the student ‘voice’.
They also support flexibility for those who wish to extend them to achieve consistency – through reaching consensus – within a programme, major, or specialisation. The intention is not to stifle creativity but to provide a foundation on which teachers can build.
Have questions about our CBP design templates? Visit our FAQs page for detailed answers on benefits, course content management, navigation, and more.
Adopting Canvas Baseline Practices
Adopting the Baseline Practices establishes a foundation for quality and consistency across courses. Exploring the Baseline Plus suggestions can further enhance interactivity, relationships, and personalised assessments.
Review the key elements of each and consider how to implement them in your Canvas courses.
Canvas Baseline
The Canvas Baselines provide the minimum recommended standards for course design. These practices aim to deliver a consistent, accessible, and easy to navigate course structure for students.
Explore the five Baseline recommendations for Canvas course design:
Canvas Baseline Plus
The Baseline Plus practices provide suggestions for enhancing courses with more engaging, interactive learning experiences. Aligning with the University’s Signature Pedagogies.
Explore the four focus areas of Baseline Plus aligned with our signature pedagogical practices:
- Programme consistency
- Technology Enhanced Learning
- Relational Learning
- Assessment for Learning
View a printable version of the Canvas Baseline Practices.
CBP Faculty design templates files
Get a head start on implementing the Canvas Baseline practices by leveraging shared baseline templates. Ranga Auaha Ako has collaborated with faculties, schools, and departments to create a unified design that adheres to these core standards and accessibility guidelines.
These templates allow you to easily copy the fundamental course structure, content pages, syllabus, assessments, and navigation. You can then customise and build on this foundation for your specific needs.
Video demonstration
This short video (1:30s) will guide you through the process of importing the Canvas Baseline Practices template into your Canvas course. Click ‘play’ then click the ‘full screen’ button, or watch it in YouTube.
- Download the Template
- Scroll down to CBP template files and previews and download the template file for your faculty, school, or department.
- Open Your Canvas Course
- In Canvas, go to the homepage of the course where you want to use the template.
- On the right side of the page, click on Import Existing Content.
- Import the Template
- Under Content Type, select Canvas Course Export Package.
- Click Choose File and select the template file you just downloaded.
- Select All Content
- Under Content, choose All Content.
- Start the Import
- Click the Import button to begin the process.
- Organise Your Content
- Once the import is finished, review the new template in your course.
- Add or move any course-specific content into the new page templates.
CBP template files and previews
Find the right template for your faculty, school or major below.
Faculty of Science
Business School
Faculty of Education and Social Work
Auckland Law School
Faculty of Engineering
Tertiary Foundation Certificate
Creative Arts and Industries
*Templates may vary between schools
Creative Arts and Industries
Faculty of Arts
*Templates may vary between majors
Faculty of Arts
- Chinese, German, Pacific Studies
- Italian
- Career, European Studies, History, Japanese
- Art Scholars and Classical Studies and Ancient History
- Anthropology, Art History, Arts General, Asian Studies, Criminology, Drama, English, Gender Studies, Global, Linguistics, Media and Screen Studies, Politics and International Relations, Sociology, Theological and Religious Studies
- Māori Studies
- Communication
- Comparative Literature
- French
- Korean
- Latin
- Samoan
- Tongan
Support
For help with assessment design, digital learning, course design, relational learning, writing learning outcomes, accessibility, or Canvas Baseline Practices, the Ranga Auaha Ako, Learning and Teaching Design Team are hear to help. Contact them through the TeachWell Consult portal.
See also
About the project
The project is part of the Curriculum Transformation Programme. See the Staff Intranet for more.
Page updated 17/10/2024 (added link to FAQs)
- Jong, Ton. (2010). Cognitive load theory, educational research, and instructional design: Some food for thought. Instructional Science. 38. 105-134. 10.1007/s11251-009-9110-0. ↩
- CAST. (2018). The UDL Guidelines. http://udlguidelines.cast.org ↩
- CAST. (2018). The UDL Guidelines. http://udlguidelines.cast.org ↩