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How do I connect to Canvas?

← Managing a Sentral System
To access the Canvas integration configuration screen:

1. Click on the Setup cog at the top-right of the Sentral interface.


2. Click on Integrations.


3. Scroll down on the integrations screen until you get to the Canvas area. Do not click on the Canvas logo as this will take you to the Canvas website. Make sure to click on the Configure link under the logo.



This will take you to the Canvas integration configuration screen. We'll walk through the settings and guide you on the initial setup for your first sync. Before proceeding, there are a few tasks you need to complete in Canvas. Please refer to details in "What are the setup requirements for using Canvas?".

The image below illustrates the Canvas configuration screen in Sentral. Each field on this screenshot is numbered to correspond with the descriptions provided, ensuring clarity and ease of reference.

Buttons

  • Test Connection button: when clicked will advise if the Canvas connection is successful. If the test connection fails, you should check your API Key and URL are correct.
  • Sync Now button: is used to run an ad-hoc sync with Canvas. You should use this when you are first setting things up or if there is some other reason to manually run a sync. Otherwise, the Auto Sync function should be sufficient once you are up and running.
  • Get SIS Import files button: will send you an email with a ZIP file containing the SIS Import files that were sent to Canvas on the last sync. If there are changes in Sentral that have not yet been synced, you may wish to run an ad-hoc sync using the Sync Now button to generate files with the latest data.
  • Rollover Data button: is used when you need to roll your timetable data from one time period to another. What this effectively does is clears the database that Sentral uses to track the differences in the data being sent to Canvas from one sync to the next. This is how it knows what to do with changes in enrolments when a student changes courses. You should press this button at the beginning of the year once your new timetable data is in Sentral and then run an ad-hoc sync. You will also do this when you roll over from one Year 12 cohort to the next for NSW schools (between Term 3 and Term 4).
  • Update Data button: This button updates the student and timetable data from the source system. If you want the most up to date data sent to Canvas click this button prior to clicking “Sync Now” button. Note if “Auto-Sync” is set-up in below fields, then this will occur automatically also.

Fields

  1. Last Sync: This is the time of the last synchronisation with Canvas.
  2. API Key: This is where you paste the API token you just created as the Admin user in Canvas.
  3. URL: Paste your school’s instructure.com Canvas URL in this field. Make sure when you are doing your first sync to your Canvas instance that you test in your test or beta environments ( https://yourschool.test.instructure.com or https://yourschool.beta.instructure.com ). That way, if there are any issues with the data, you can fix it in Sentral before it goes into production. The token you created in your production environment will not be available in beta or test until they are refreshed with data from production. This generally happens on the third weekend of the month for test and every Monday morning for beta.
  4. Exclusions: Add in any timetabled “classes” that are in Sentral that are not actual academic courses in this Exclusions field (comma-separated list). These are usually things like Duty Rosters, Assembly, etc. This should exclude those from coming across in the data being sent from Sentral to Canvas.
  5. Auto-Sync: Once your data looks good in test or beta and you have done an initial manual sync to production, you can turn on Auto Sync. This will automatically sync the data from Sentral to Canvas at the time indicated in the drop-down. 7am is an ideal time to setup as this gives Sentral enough time to complete its synchronisation with other systems feeding into it.
  6. Course Structure: Ticking the Course Structure box is usually not recommended. It affects how courses come into Canvas from your timetable data in Sentral. This is best controlled by the way you set up course codes in your timetabling software, which is discussed in the “Blueprints in Canvas” section of this guide.
  7. Authentication Provider: The authentication provider will be the type of authentication you use to log into Canvas. Most schools utilise Single Sign-On (SSO) authentication. For DoE NSW schools, we recommend using MS Office 365 as your SSO provider rather than Google as Google can sometimes have conflicts when students are already logged into the browser with their own Gmail accounts.
  8. Username Format: This is the format of the username that users will need to enter to log into Canvas. For Canvas, Google and Microsoft Office 365 authentication, this should be an email address. For other methods, it may still be an email address, but may also be one of the other options, depending on your SSO setup.
  9. Deleted Status – Enrolments: The Deleted Status menu is used to select the status of an enrolment when a student is removed from a course. More information with regards to Enrolment Statuses can be found here. We recommend either completed or inactive, unless it is very early in the school year.
  10. Year 12 Term: The Year 12 Term is used to set up a separate Canvas Term for the Year 12 courses coming into Canvas. The course codes in your timetabling software need to start with either a 12 or Y12 to be recognised as Year 12 courses. This is mostly used in NSW where Year 12 begins in Term 4, but some schools do something similar in other states too. For more information on Terms, you can visit this guide on Terms in the Canvas Community, but the short version is that Terms generally correlate to an academic year for most schools. We encourage you to discuss Terms further with your Canvas CSM.
  11. Provisions Parents?: This tick box creates parent user accounts in Canvas (as Observers), based on the relationships you have set up in Sentral. Parent accounts use Canvas Authentication to log into Canvas. Speak to your Canvas CSM about the best way to set up the different pathways for parents to log into Canvas and to set up a separate listing in the Canvas mobile apps for parents.
  12. Update Student Emails: Student email addresses are only updated the first time a student is first seen in the sync files being sent to Canvas. Select this box to force the sync to check the email address of the student and update it in Canvas to what is currently recorded in the Sentral data for that student.
  13. Update Usernames: By default, student and teacher usernames are only imported into the LMS when the user is FIRST seen. If you want to re-create the usernames for students and staff on every sync, then check this button.
  14. Disable Rollclasses: Checking this excludes roll classes when syncing data, only timetable classes will be included.

Make sure to click save when you make any changes to the settings on the configuration screen.

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