30DaysofCanvas 2022: Week One

In August 2020, I had kind of an insane idea. I planned out to make 30 free Canvas homepage designs and put them out through my blog. At the time, like many, I was helping teachers to get prepared for the online component of learning for the school year and had spent a lot of time in Canvas training sessions, either presenting or learning. One thing that was fairly consistent was the emphasis on designing a homepage for your classes to meet their needs. This meant that many educators spent time designing their homepage and connecting design to the practical needs of their classrooms. However, many teachers needed support to meet the needs of an online learning component. So, I decided to use my burgeoning design skills with my Canvas knowledge to build out 30 homepage templates for teachers to use in their classrooms free of charge.

In just over two years, these templates have been downloaded almost 12,000 times off of Canvas Commons.

That means a lot to me and I wanted to bring it back again this year as a way to continue the tradition, but also to add a bit more flexibility within the process. Over the past two years, my design skills have gotten better, but also my Canvas skills have grown. For this year’s iteration, each template has a banner, space for classroom customization, course content buttons, and an about the teacher section, but instead of using the banners/language I used in the original design, you can now download the image via Google Drawings and add your own name/classroom name to it for all banners and buttons. Getting even more into it, if you are a Canva user, which is free for any educator, I have linked my designs as edited Canva designs and you can download a gif format if you would like.

All the designs are uploaded through Canvas Commons and you can download any of the designs listed below today for use in your course. Again, completely free of charge and free forever. I will be releasing 4-5 designs a week every week in September. Check out this week’s designs below. Click on the pictures below to go to Canvas Commons to add the design to your classes (make sure to sign in to your Canvas account first):

Arc Homepage Template

Bridge Homepage Template

Burroughs Homepage Template

Mountains Homepage Template

Railway Homepage Template

Join me back here next Wednesday for more free Canvas Homepage Templates. Thanks!