In this supportive guide you will find resources on how to use this tool in your teaching.
- For general information about OneDrive, please see back to the tool's main page.
- For details on technical help with this tool, please refer to the support section on the main tool page.
Overview
OneDrive is a searchable place to host and share files inside Canvas or using personal OneDrive space. Its best use is to help students share information and a common product when their learning is collaborative. In a typical in-person class without technology like Office 365 and OneDrive, you might ask students to discuss some key ideas and share their thinking with the class.
Teaching examples
Enhance
Enhance collaboration
- Using a shared Word document, Excel spreadsheet or deck of PowerPoint slides enhances idea generation and application, because your students can all access each group’s thinking, increasing student access to collaboratively generate ideas during and outside of class time.
- Shared documents also make learning more accessible, because students with processing and hearing issues get notetaking summaries, and language learners can translate complex disciplinary language as they review. For online courses, active and collaborative learning improves student results and is easily achieved with sharing tools.
Extend
Extend collaboration to deepen learning
- Sharing Office 365 files via OneDrive can also allow students to document their learning journey. For example, a personal OneNote can house student reflections, link to their related files, allow them to comment, and document your annotation or comments when they share it with you. You can even make a common template in OneNote and share it via OneDrive so all students have the optimal structure for their reflections.
- Reflecting about work extends and deepens the learning students do and makes it more likely they will remember and use what they learn in your class. When reflection is digital and shared via OneDrive, students can share with just you, other classmates, or even designated people off-campus who may participate in the assessment.
- Integrating Office 365 into your Canvas courses creates additional opportunities for students to create and collaborate on work.
Empower
Empower collaboration beyond campus to improve transferable skills
- Students are empowered when a project is useful for work that mimics what they will do professionally, or is even a project someone will use, like an open-pedagogy assessment. File sharing via OneDrive allows students to work on a common project for a client or even add the client in.
- Keep in mind that when a link is shared via OneDrive with the setting of “anyone who is given the link”, the link will expire after six weeks. Longer-term projects will require that a link is reshared. See sharing details.