The Canvas Roll Call Attendance tool can be a useful tool to quickly record daily attendance, particularly for smaller classes, but there are some issues that an instructor needs to be aware of.

The Roll Call Attendance tool is a Learning Tool Integration (LTI) that can be integrated with your Canvas course and used for taking attendance in Canvas courses. Once added, the Attendance tool displays in the Canvas course navigation menu on the left for instructors and can be used to electronically track student attendance in your course.

Students will not be able to see the Attendance link in the course navigation menu but can view their attendance report through the Roll Call Attendance submission details page.

Activating Attendance

The Roll Call Attendance tool remains inactive until the instructor marks any student absent or present for a particular day. To begin using the tool, just click Attendance in the Canvas course menu, find a particular day, and mark students in the roster present, absent or late. See the How do I take roll call using the Attendance tool? article for more details.

Once the tool is used for the first time, an Assignment called Roll Call Attendance will be created. This will also generate a Roll Call Attendance column in the course gradebook.

Attendance Badges

The Roll Call tool includes "badges" which allow instructors to add notes about a student's activities on a given day. To add and use Roll Call badges, see information on the Configuring Roll Call Attendance tool page.

PIN Code

Canvas does not currently support students updating their own attendance with a daily PIN code.

Taking Attendance

Once the Attendance tool has been added to your course and your course has been published, you can use the Attendance tool in multiple ways. You can take attendance for your course from the Course View or List View, check attendance for specific dates, and add badges during role call. You can also run attendance reports and export to Excel.

Assignment Grades

Canvas also provides the ability to assign grades based on student attendance and customize how those grades are calculated. You can also place attendance into an assignment group to record assignment grades or assign a weight to the assignment portion of the student's grades.

Links

• Canvas: How to Incorporate Learning Tool Integrations (LTIs) in Your Course
• Canvas: Using Attendance Grades and Assignment Groups
• How do I take roll call using the Attendance tool?
• How do I run Roll Call Attendance reports in a course?
• How do I edit the Roll Call Attendance assignment?