This is the latest information on changes to UWM’s Digital Learning Environment which includes changes to Canvas, Proctorio, Zoom, and other services available in Canvas.
Updates are made regularly to bring new features, improve the user experience, and fix bugs. For each item, the change date is provided. Release Summaries are used to communicate planned updates for the given month and may include updates which occurred after the previous update.
Service Maintenance
No maintenance is planned for these changes.
Major Changes
- All Digital Learning Environment Services
- April 14, 2023: New Phone Support Number – 414-251-5050
- Canvas LMS
- April 4, 2023: (Administrators Only) New Canvas Admin Analytics
- April 15, 2023: (New Quizzes) Grade by Question in SpeedGrader
- April 15, 2023: (New Quizzes) Share Item Banks to Current Course
- Kaltura/My Media
- April 19, 2023: Video Hotspots Now Available
All Digital Learning Environment Services
April 14, 2023: New Phone Support Number – 414-251-5050
UWM has introduced a new phone number, 414-251-5050, for all Canvas users to contact for phone-based support for any service related to the Digital Learning Environment (DLE).
- Before the change: Canvas users had to call different phone numbers depending on the service they needed help with, such as Canvas, Zoom, or digital textbooks. They also had to choose between calling the toll-free numbers provided by Instructure or the UWM Help Desk or CETL numbers.
- After the change: Canvas users can call one phone number, 414-251-5050, and follow the prompts to be routed to the correct support office for any service, regardless of Canvas usage. They can also still contact Canvas support, Zoom support, or other services online (by chat, email, etc.) if they prefer.
- How this affects teaching and learning: This quality-of-life change simplifies the process of getting phone-based support for Canvas and other DLE services, reduces the wait time and transfers for phone-based support, provides a path to phone support for services other than Canvas which are integrated, and enables users to resolve support cases faster.
The change does not affect the existing phone numbers used at UWM, such as the Help Desk and CETL numbers. Existing phone numbers will continue to work and are not changing at this time. Instructors and support officers should list 414-251-5050 as the phone number for support for their Canvas courses.
The change does not affect users who are used to calling the toll-free phone numbers provided by Instructure. They can still call them if they wish, but they may benefit from switching to 414-251-5050 because it offers more comprehensive phone support.
See “Digital Learning Environment – FAQ for 414-251-5050 Support Number” for additional information about 5050.
Canvas LMS
April 4, 2023: (Administrators Only) New Canvas Admin Analytics
Canvas Admin Analytics is a new feature preview that allows Canvas administrators to view, filter, and download data about Canvas usage, course success, and student engagement in three new dashboards: Overview, Course, and Student.
- Before the change: Canvas administrators had limited access to data about Canvas adoption and engagement across courses and students. They had to rely on manual or third-party tools to analyze and visualize the data.
- After the change: Canvas administrators can access interactive and customizable dashboards that show data about Canvas adoption, course engagement, and student outcomes at the institution-wide or sub-account level. They can also drill down to see or export details and link to courses within Canvas.
- How this affects teaching and learning: The change can help Canvas administrators to: Identify areas where additional training or support is needed to drive adoption and success, learn from best practices of courses that effectively use Canvas features, evaluate student engagement and performance across courses, and target interventions for students or courses based on data to promote student success.
The change is part of a feature preview that is in active development. To provide direct feedback about this feature, administrators can post in the Admin Analytics user group. Sub-account admins need both Grades – View all Grades and Analytics View Pages permissions enabled to view Admin Analytics data for their sub-account(s). The feature is not yet available in the mobile app or the beta environment.
April 15, 2023: (New Quizzes) Grade by Question in SpeedGrader
Important: Instructors are encouraged to always use Classic Quizzes unless New Quizzes offers a feature that is critical for a course. Contact CETL or your school/college support office for further guidance.
Grade by Question is a feature option that allows instructors to grade one question at a time for New Quizzes in SpeedGrader. To enable this feature, click the settings icon and select Options from the drop-down menu in SpeedGrader.
- Before the change: Instructors had to scroll through all the questions and answers for each student submission in SpeedGrader. Instructors had to navigate to the bottom of the page to update the score or switch to another student. Instructors had no easy way to see which questions required manual grading or jump to a specific question.
- After the change: Instructors can use the question navigation bar to move between questions or click on a question number to focus on that question. Instructors can see a summary box that shows which questions need to be reviewed, then click on a hyperlink to go directly to Instructors can use the previous and next student buttons and the update score button within each question box.
- How this affects teaching and learning: This change reduces extra steps and scrolling for instructors when grading quizzes, saving them time and effort. It also enhances accessibility for keyboard-only and screen reader users, making grading more inclusive and user-friendly.
To learn more about this feature, review Instructure’s feature video on “Grade by Question” and review Instructure’s KB article on how to grade one quiz question at a time in New Quizzes. Note that single question quiz grading is also available for Classic Quizzes.
April 15, 2023: (New Quizzes) Share Item Banks to Current Course
Important: Instructors are encouraged to always use Classic Quizzes unless New Quizzes offers a feature that is critical for a course. Contact CETL or your school/college support office for further guidance.
The “Share with course” checkbox in New Quizzes allows instructors to share an item bank with the current course when creating a new item bank in the New Quizzes Build page. This feature simplifies the process of sharing item banks and saves instructors time and clicks.
- the change: When creating a New Quiz Item Bank, instructors had to create an item bank first, then go to the Item Banks page and click the share icon next to the item bank name, then type in the course name and select the access level.
- After the change: Instructors can create an item bank and share it with the current course in one step, by selecting a checkbox when naming the item bank. Instructors can still share an item bank with other courses or users from the Item Banks page.
- How this affects teaching and learning: This change makes it easier for instructors to create and share item banks with their courses, which can facilitate quiz creation and collaboration. It also allows support staff to better assist instructors when creating assessments using New Quizzes.
Instructors are strongly encouraged to click this checkbox when creating new item banks. By default, question banks in New Quizzes are “owned” by the instructor, not the course. By clicking this checkbox, instructors ensure their question banks are available to other teachers in the course, as well as administrators and support staff who may need to assist with the course.
Kaltura/My Media
April 19, 2023: Video Hotspots Now Available
ability to add hotspots has been enabled in Kaltura which is integrated into Canvas as My Media. This new feature empowers instructors to incorporate clickable links at specific points in their videos, enhancing interactivity and engagement for viewers.
- Before the change: Video owners were unable to add clickable links within their videos. Interactivity and engagement in videos were limited, and viewers had a passive viewing experience without interactive elements.
- After the change: Video owners can add clickable links, known as hotspots, to their videos. Hotspots enable interactive elements within videos, allowing viewers to access additional resources, websites, or related content by clicking on specific points in the video. Hotspots can also jump users to different time indexes in the video.
- How this affects teaching and learning: The Hotspots feature offers a more immersive and interactive learning experience by providing additional resources and context within the video itself, as well as the ability to jump through videos to create a kind of interactive story.
To utilize the Hotspots feature, video owners need to edit their videos and add hotspots at designated points using the Kaltura Video Editing Tools. Instructors are encouraged to review the Kaltura guides on Adding Hotspots to Your Video and the Kaltura Video Editing Tools – Hotspots Tab for detailed instructions on incorporating hotspots into their videos.
Additional Changes
- Canvas LMS
- April 12, 2023: In the Gradebook, instructors can sort individual assignment columns and rows by excused submissions and unposted grades.
- April 12, 2023: In the Rich Content Editor Equation Editor, an Equilibrium button has been added.
- April 26, 2023: The Rich Content Editor toolbar slides to expand when using a narrow browser window.
- April 26, 2023: When users in a group receive an announcement notification via email, a warning displays that email replies posted to the announcement are seen by everyone in the group.
- Canvas Mobile Apps
- April 20, 2023: (Android Student and Teacher Apps): In the Inbox, users can swipe to mark messages as read and unread. Additionally, users can bulk archive, mark as read or unread, favorite and delete.
- April 20, 2023: (Android Student App): The Assignment Details page includes a drop-down menu to view multiple submission attempts.
- April 27, 2023: (iOS Student and Teacher Apps): In settings, tap “About” to view app details.
- Zoom Desktop and Mobile Clients
- April 17, 2023: (Windows, MacOS) Users may customize the color of caption text.
- April 17, 2023: (Windows, MacOS, Linux) Interpreters may choose to unmute. themselves even when muting of participants is enforced by the host.
- Zoom Whiteboard
- April 23, 2023: A mini-map has been added to help participants find content on
- April 23, 2023: Objects can be snapped to a grid.
- April 23, 2023: Callout shapes for diagramming, flowcharting and idea mapping have been added.
- April 23, 2023: (Meetings) Hosts automatically own created whiteboards.
- April 23, 2023: Timers can be set to give participants a gauge of activity time remaining. Timers set outside meetings are not visible in meetings. Timers in meetings only appear to participants in the meeting.
- April 23, 2023: Whiteboards can now be exported as CSV files for analysis.
Learn More
To learn more about updates, and to see how the changes may affect instructors’ and students’ work, refer to the release note links. Remember that some features may not be enabled for UWM or the UW System.
Editor’s note: ChatGPT and Bing Chat were used to draft this article. Additionally, text from Canvas Release and Deploy notes, and Zoom Release Notes were re-used with permission.