Can a page contain text that the students won't see?

[Sachelis]

I would like to include text notes on pages that the students won't see. These would primarily be reminders to me of how I would like to improve the page, e.g., "Record a video and insert it here," or "Expand this section when I have more time," or "Rewrite this for clarity." I might also include notes that mention learning outcomes or remind me of my sources. 

[JeffCampbell]

There are a couple of options if you are set on doing this on each page, but hidden from students. A quick method would be to put text onto the page, but make the text white. When highlighted, the text will be visible, but otherwise not. The downside is that students can easily see the comments by doing the same thing. It will also leave visible gaps in the text.

Another way is the HTML editor. Traditional HTML comments will work, but every time you open the editing pane to look at them, you will get notice of "auto-saved content" asking if you want to load it. If you say no...the comment disappears.

A way around this is to set a division, but with a tag to display nothing. This will require you to visit the HTML editor every time you want to review comments, so only you (or another teacher using the course) can see the comments. To do this, use the following in the HTML editor (remember that the Pretty Editor defaults to the bottom of the page, so putting the code at the end of everything will reduce your need to search for it):

<div style="display: none;">Comments go here</div>

Then put your comments in the spot marked. This works well if you just want to have some notes all in one spot.

If you want to put notes throughout your page, then we can look at an alternative way to implement divisions. A slight variation to the HTML looks like this:

<div data-comment-abc123="This is a general comment that does not affect the look of the page">Put your normal content here.</div>

For this option, the part that says data-comment-abc123 is a bit modifiable, a bit not. The part in red needs to be kept intact, but you can modify the part in green. Put whatever notes you want inside the quotation marks (part in blue). The part in orange is where you can put all of the content you want students to see. If you remove any of the part in red, it will strip out the comment and leave just <div>, so just be careful about that. You could feasibly set up a system for yourself. So the part that says -abc123 could be -teaching_note, -revise, -citation, etc. as reminders to yourself about the notes.

Hopefully, one of these might provide an option to consider for putting the comments on the page.

[Sachelis]

Wow! You put some thought into those, Jeff! I had considered using normal html comments <!-- --->, but I mostly work in WYSIWYG mode and would undoubtedly forget that I had comments in the html. I do appreciate you taking the time to spell out the options!

In other non-Canvas sites that I maintain, I use scripting to hide blocks of text (using css) based on the user's IP address. I was hoping Canvas might have an "instructor's css class" that would allow comments to be hidden for all but the instructor.

[JeffCampbell]

I had looked into it myself at one point. Decided against it for similar reasons. @Hildi_Pardo 's idea is easier (and what I do), but figured I would focus on the hidden on page aspect because that is the one that is a bit more confusing to make work right.

[Hildi_Pardo · Accepted solution]

Hi!  One way might be to add a LOT of space at the bottom with a horizontal rule (which means they would have to scroll down a lot to see your notes)  and just add a header that says "notes for next year" -- BTW, I don't think there is anything wrong with students seeing potential notes for improvement.

The way I make notes for myself is not on the page itself.  I like to make a hidden (unpublished) module at the top of my modules page and call it something like "Do NOT Publish:  Hidden Notes" and then make a page in that module with a similar title.     Here I keep a running list of all my notes.    I'll usually make it as a bulleted list, and include a link to specific pages, or modules, or assignments, and with the notes I have for improvement.  

[Sachelis]

Thanks for that, Hildi! I hadn't considered white text, although I expect I would forget about the comments myself! I think the "do not publish" page is the best option, and that's what I've been doing. (I have a module named, "_Steve's Notes" that contains several pages, e.g., "_Design Overview", "_To Do Items", etc.) I was just hoping <g> there was a way to keep the notes closer to the pages.

[dbrace]

Hi @Sachelis,

One downside to the first option (LOTS of space) from @Hildi_Pardo, is that using the "Previous" and "Next" buttons would not be as convenient.

Most of our instructors create notes for themself as by putting unpublished pages (if a "long" note) or unpublished text headers (if a "short" note) into their modules.

-Doug

[Chris_Hofer]

Hi there, @Sachelis ...

In addition to these great ideas by @JeffCampbell and @Hildi_Pardo ... I wanted to offer yet another option.  Do you know if your school has purchased the DesignPLUS add-on from Cidi Labs?  If so, they offer some "instructor only" tools that insert boxes where students will not be able to see anything within them.  You'd need to reach out to your school's Canvas administrator to see if DesignPLUS has been integrated into your Canvas courses or not.

I hope this will also be of some help to you.  Good luck!