Formatting: creating structure on a page

Presenting information in Canvas is quite easy and allows you to create visual hierarchies within a page, assignment or other element within their course. This page highlights some ways to create this hierarchy to present information in away that is accessible to all learners. 

Headings

By using text styling in the canvas rich-text editor, you can create a visual hierarchy of text, which can be read by most screen readers in place to assist learners who may be visually impaired. To use these, just select a Heading size you'd like to use - usually you can use Heading 2 for major sections, and Heading 3-5 for subsections. This also helps to create a visual structure for all students, to let them know that content is broken into sections. All sections on this page are broken up in this way.

Sub-headings

Sub headings are also encouraged, as these will allow learners to skip through content to see major sections, with minor sub-sections both visually and through screen reading software.

Sub-Headings and Accessibility

Using heading tags is important as it allows those using screen reader software who many have visual challenges to 'read' text in a hierarchical fashion, so structuring content around major topics with sub-topics can help learners jump to specific areas of a page and focus on what they want to. The below structure outlines how this may work.

• H2: Animals
  • H3: Mammals
    • H4: Gibbons
  • H3: Reptiles
    • H4: Iguanas
• H2: Plants

Indenting

Text can be indented...

...like this, to bring attention to a quote or other important line of text. Text can even be made bold or italicized to bring extra emphasis to written content.

Bullets

Just as in other word processing applications, the use of bullets to provide concise and stratified information is a great way to present information.

• Dotted bullets
  • provide a great way to provide
    • hierarchy

1. Numbered bullets
2. could be used to list the
3. steps involved in completing a task 
4. within Canvas

Emojis

Use of emojis (characters that express emotions or emotional reactions) are very common in day to day online discourse, so using them within the context of Canvas is completely fine - even encouraged 🎉

Emojis can be used anywhere text is present, including module headings (use a  ✅ a  ➜ to mark current modules), rubrics (for assessment criteria levels - 🙁 < 😑 < 🙂 <😃), etc. They are also a good way to highlight text for attention (like the heading above) or to liven up some text.  

Tables

Tables should primarily used to share data, not for design purposes. Tables within Canvas can provide an opportunity to present information in a clean and structured manner. 

White Space

Define, and explain how it improves reading and ability to focus, and process the information.

Explain that default formatting doesn't allow for the formatting conventions we are used to in print, and Canvas behaves inconsistently with white space before/after paragraphs and other elements....

References

Many online readings pages will include references to academic articles, book chapters or websites. To keep these in the hierarchy of the page, use heading style H2 for the word "References", but to visually separate them, it's recommended to use a horizontal rule <hr> tag followed by a heading and each reference in APA format (if that is what you want to model for the students).  Example below with sample text:

References

The items below are listed for your reference only, and you are not required to read them.

• Hartley, James. (2004). Designing instructional and informational text. Handbook of research on educational communications and technology. 
• The power of white space Links to an external site.

Source: page developed by Parm Gill, ETS, UBC.