I wish them well! There's definitely room for innovation in this space.
One thing that bothers me, though (and this is based on a quick run-through of their demo, so I'm prepared to be set straight if this is not correct):
It looks like they've made the same mistake as Blackboard, WebCT, etc. by making resource type (files, assignments, discussion forums, etc.) the primary organizational method rather than organizing by instructional unit.
It may make good sense from a programming perspective to put all the discussion forums together, all the downloadable files together, all the external web links together, but that's not the mental model that teachers use. To a teacher teaching (e.g.) American history, the PDF of the Gettysburg Address and the PDF of the Declaration of Independence don't "go together". Instead, the Gettysburg Address "goes together" with the discussion forum on the American Civil War and the link to the National Park Service page on the Battle of Gettysburg.
Most teachers would prefer to build the Civil War unit in one place, rather than clicking back and forth between the file section and the discussion forum section and whatnot.
Canvas does have a "Module" type that lets you do this, more or less, but it's not the primary schema for organization.
If they want this system to have maximum comprehensibility and usability for teachers and students alike, I'd recommend that they promote their Modules to the top level, and make them the primary organizational method for the system.
Moodle gets this right -- few of the others do. When you start a new Moodle course, you see a list of weeks (or topics) to which you can then add files, discussion forums, web links...on an ad hoc basis. While you CAN click on links in Moodle to see all the files in one place, all the assignments in one place, and so on, in practice no one ever does that (except maybe at the beginning of the semester when the students click on the assignments link to make a note of all the due dates).
You don't have to copy Moodle slavishly, but please don't copy the organizational schemas of Blackboard and WebCT. They just plain suck.
One thing that bothers me, though (and this is based on a quick run-through of their demo, so I'm prepared to be set straight if this is not correct):
It looks like they've made the same mistake as Blackboard, WebCT, etc. by making resource type (files, assignments, discussion forums, etc.) the primary organizational method rather than organizing by instructional unit.
It may make good sense from a programming perspective to put all the discussion forums together, all the downloadable files together, all the external web links together, but that's not the mental model that teachers use. To a teacher teaching (e.g.) American history, the PDF of the Gettysburg Address and the PDF of the Declaration of Independence don't "go together". Instead, the Gettysburg Address "goes together" with the discussion forum on the American Civil War and the link to the National Park Service page on the Battle of Gettysburg.
Most teachers would prefer to build the Civil War unit in one place, rather than clicking back and forth between the file section and the discussion forum section and whatnot.
Canvas does have a "Module" type that lets you do this, more or less, but it's not the primary schema for organization.
If they want this system to have maximum comprehensibility and usability for teachers and students alike, I'd recommend that they promote their Modules to the top level, and make them the primary organizational method for the system.
Moodle gets this right -- few of the others do. When you start a new Moodle course, you see a list of weeks (or topics) to which you can then add files, discussion forums, web links...on an ad hoc basis. While you CAN click on links in Moodle to see all the files in one place, all the assignments in one place, and so on, in practice no one ever does that (except maybe at the beginning of the semester when the students click on the assignments link to make a note of all the due dates).
You don't have to copy Moodle slavishly, but please don't copy the organizational schemas of Blackboard and WebCT. They just plain suck.