Using OneDrive and Files in Canvas as a Student

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Canvas allows students to use, create, share, and collaborate on Office 365 files within Canvas through Microsoft OneDrive and Canvas' File feature. Students have 1 TB of storage space available within OneDrive and 2 GB of storage within Canvas. Additional information with Educator Documentation and Click-through Demos can be found on the Canvas support site.

Audience

This article is intended for students using both Canvas and Microsoft OneDrive.

Article Overview

Files in Canvas are separated into three main feature areas and can be accessed and managed in a variety of ways:

  • User files, viewed in your user profile
  • Course files, viewed in each course where you are enrolled
  • Group files, viewed in each group where you are a member

Each Canvas Course has a storage limit of 2 GB; Canvas Studio has a maximum file upload size of 500 MB. Some courses, due to the subjects covered, or the chosen method of delivery may have larger files or groups of files than others.

For more information, view How do I use Files as a Student? from the Instructure Community and the Use Microsoft OneDrive with your LMS article from Microsoft.

Submitting Files in Assignments

You can submit an online assignment that embeds a Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, or Excel document. directly from your OneDrive or computer.

How do I submit a cloud assignment with OneDrive?

If your instructor creates a cloud assignment with a Microsoft OneDrive file, you can open the assignment, edit the document directly, and submit your changes as your assignment submission. For more information, view How do I submit a cloud assignment with Microsoft Office 365? from the Instructure Community.

  1. Click Assignments in your course navigation.
  2. Click on the assignment you wish to submit to.
  3. Make the changes in the attached document. If you wish to open the document in a separate browser tab, click Edit Document.
  4. When you are ready to submit, click the Submit Assignment button.

How do I upload a file from OneDrive as an assignment submission?

If your course has enabled Microsoft Office 365, you can upload a file from your Microsoft OneDrive for an assignment. Like other file upload submissions, files uploaded from Office 365 are uploaded into your Canvas user files submissions folder.

  1. Click Assignments in your course navigation.
  2. Click on the assignment you wish to submit to.
  3. Under Choose a submission type, click the  More button.
  4. Select OneDrive.
    This is a screenshot of the submission type options.
  5. Select the document you wish to submit.
  6. Click Submit.

How do I upload a file as an assignment submission?

For more information, view How do I upload a file as an assignment submission? from the Instructure Community.

Participating in Collaborations

You can participate in or create collaborations with colleagues with a Microsoft Word, Excel, or PowerPoint file.

  1. Click Collaborations in your course navigation.
  2. If you want to start a new collaboration:
    1. Click the +Start a new collaboration button.
    2. Under the type drop-down, select the type of document you want to collaborate on or click Select Existing Document to select the document you want to collaborate on.
    3. Type in a document name and description under the Document Name and Document text box.
    4. Add in any collaborators.
    5. Click Save.
  3. If you want to collaborate on an existing document:
    1. Select the collaboration that you will work on. This opens the collaboration document in a new tab where you can see other students editing the same document.

View and Edit OneDrive Files in Course Navigation

Files stored in OneDrive can be viewed through the Microsoft OneDrive link in the Course Navigation. With the recent update to OneDrive's LTI in Canvas, you can add new folders, upload files, sort files and folders, and edit documents directly from OneDrive within Canvas. Files in Microsoft OneDrive are your personal files and only visible to you, unless shared through other methods.

  1. Click Microsoft OneDrive in your course navigation.
  2. Open a file and edit the document directly in your browser as desired.
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