[ARCHIVED] Observer Access Limited to a Specific District Created Canvas Course

[ttowne]

Our district has recently opened access to basically beta test the use of observer for parents (we are only letting certain teachers know about the change so they can do some videos for our teachers about how this looks specifically for our district).  However, one of my concerns is that parents will have access to all of the child's Canvas courses instead of just the one that a specific teacher has.  Because our Canvas courses are created/linked by PowerSchool and it is a district enabled/named course, it seems as if a parent has access to their child's Canvas account, then they would see all of the courses that child is enrolled in, even if their teacher doesn't use Canvas.  Is there a way that if a teacher is not using a Canvas course or they don't want parents to see the Canvas course, that they can restrict an observer access for their particular course?  This is kind've a make or break thing with some of our teachers because they are hesitant at this point to start using Canvas if parents can see what they are... or are not doing compared to other teachers.  Any insight into this would be great.  Thank you.

Travis

[ddaniels]

Hey, Travis!

I work solely in the virtual setting and all of our students have their observers tied to our accounts and you are absolutely right, they see all the things! As I was reading your post, I was like "why wouldn't you want that?" But, after reading it (#teacherproblem), I totally get it! There might be way better suggestions out there than me, but right now we have given our students read-only access to their semester one courses: they can't submit assignments or edit anything, but if they want to click back through lessons they can. However, it was "junking" up their dashboard. We asked all of our teachers to "conclude the course." This way, students can still access it by going to "all courses," but prevents it from appearing on the dashboard. The other thing about this, too, is if a teacher doesn't use it, but then decides to use it (or vice verse), they always have the option to make this adjustment as well. You can find this option, by going to settings and then conclude course on the right hand side. I hope that helps....a little! 

[ttowne]

Thank you for the insight.  I just don't understand why parents aren't given only specific access to their child's course instead of all of the courses they have, but it is something I will continue to research.  The nice thing for us is that once the course concludes, it is removed from their dashboard automatically.  

Travis

[ddaniels]

Yes! It does remove it from the dashboard, but if they go to "all courses" from the course section, they can still access the course....if they know about that. Essentially, the observer is linked under the "people," so they can go wherever the student goes. There are a few comments in the ideas that are currently up for voting especially around being able to unpair: https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/15011-unpair-observersobservees-via-ui" modifiedtitle="true" t.... I know this isn't your exact issue, but you might be able to get something up and going over there!