Latest revision: 2022-01-26

Keep in mind

When it comes to graded tasks, we recommend that the teacher creates groups himself, so that the same people do not always choose to work together. It can create stress for the students who are not chose and also give a feeling of exclusion.

In Canvas you can choose to make groups with self sign-up

Self sign-up.

Click on People.
Click the “+ Group Set” button.
Write a group name that describes what the group work is about. Don’t include A, B, 1, 2, etc. after the name (Canvas adds a number itself).
Check Allow self sign-up.
Write how many groups you want to create ...
... and how many there may be at a maximum in each group.
Click Save

Keep in mind

If you want the students to sign up for a group, you need to be clear in informing them that they will do so. It is suggested that you inform the students in an announcement that they can now register by clicking on People in the course navigation and then on the Groups tab. Another option is to use the Message All Unassigned Students feature (see instructions below)

Send notification that registration for groups is open

You can send a message to the students directly from a group set that they can sign up for a group.

Click on the three dots to the right of + Group
Select Message all unassigned students
Write a message
Click Send message

Message all unassigned students.

Message for students.

You also need to know this about groups

If not all students sign up

After a while, you can see if all students have signed up for a group.

Go to the course navigation People, to the right of Everyone you will find the different group sets that you have created.

If there are students who have not signed up, you can remind them to do so by selecting Message all unassigned students under the three dots.
You can also let Canvas automatically distribute the remaining students by clicking Randomly assign students under the three dots.

Fix groups manually

Fix groups manually.

You can choose to manually assign students to different groups by dragging the students' name tags to different groups and also between the groups using the drag-and-drop method.

TIP: Another method to manually select, without using the drag-and-drop method, is to click the plus-sign to the right of a name and assign a group directly.

When the groups are done

Once all students have been assigned and/or signed up for a group, you can choose to remove the option to self sign-up by "locking the groups".

Go to the group set
Select Edit under the three dots
Uncheck Allow self sign-up (see step 4 above)
Click Save

Now no one can leave or swap groups.

How does it look for the student?

Groups student view.

A student can find its groups in two different ways:

Wherever the student is in Canvas, they can find all their groups from all their courses by clicking on the Groups button in the main menu (teachers do not normally have this button).
Inside a course, the student sees a list of exactly the groups they have access to.