Track Attendance with Roll Call

The Attendance (Roll Call) tool is an external app used for taking attendance in Canvas courses. The Attendance tool can be enabled for all courses in Canvas, including online or face-to-face courses.

Setting Up Attendance in a Course

In order to use the Attendance tool, you must first add it to your course navigation.  

1. Click Settings in the course navigation.  

2. At the top of your settings page, click the Navigation tab. 

3. Drag and drop Attendance from the disabled menu to the enabled navigation menu.  

4. Click Save.
   
   

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Take Attendance

Once the attendance tool is set up in your course, and your course is published, you can start to take attendance using Roll Call. The attendance tool is set by default to allow attendance to be taken seven days a week, which is helpful for courses that may have events outside the regular school week. However, grades in the gradebook will only be calculated based on the total number of days attendance has actually been recorded.

Currently you can only view Roll Call on a day-by-day basis. To view additional dates you can run an attendance report for your course. 

1. In Course Navigation, click the Attendance link. 

2. By default, Roll Call displays the List View tab, which shows all students in a list format. To view the class in the seating chart format, click the Class View tab. 

3. If your course includes sections, both views show a drop-down menu with the names of course section(s). To view students in a specific section, click the section drop-down menu. This menu displays even if your course only contains one section. 
   
   

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   Note: When a student is enrolled in multiple sections, any attendance that has been marked in one section does not display in all other section filters where the student is enrolled. 
   
   

4. By default, Roll Call will display the current date. You can edit attendance records for a different date by:

   1. Using the arrow icons next to the date

   2. Cicking the Calendar icon.
      
      

       

5. In List View, you can take attendance by toggling the attendance mark next to each student's name until you reach the desired mark.

   1. To mark the student as present and on time, click one time (green check mark icon). 

   2. To mark the student as not present, click two times (red X icon). 

   3. To mark the student as late, click three times (orange clock icon). 

   4. To unmark the attendance status, leave the button as the default (gray no symbol icon). The unmarked attendance status also indicates an excused absence. 

   5. You can also take attendance by clicking the Mark All Present button. 

   6. If you need to start over or clear all attendance entries, click the Unmark All button. 
      
      

       

6. In Class View, you can also toggle the correct mark next to each student's name (present, absent, or late), or click the Mark All Present button.

   1. To unmark all student entries, click the Unmark All button. 
      
      

View Attendance

With the Attendance tool, instructors can keep track of course attendance by taking roll electronically. Your roster will automatically populate in this tool, allowing you to:

• Choose to view the tool in a list or grid format.
  
  

   

• Customize the placement of each student in the seating chart by dragging and dropping student names onto the seating chart layout grid.
  
  

   

When you take attendance using Roll Call, Canvas automatically adds Attendance as an assignment. The default point value for attendance is 100 points. To avoid Attendance calculation errors, never delete, rename, or unpublish the Attendance assignment.

Note: Although students cannot view the actual attendance tool, they can still view the attendance assignment in the Assignments page. This assignment cannot be hidden from students. However, you can keep them from getting grade notifications by changing the assignment to Manual Grading Policy in the Gradebook.

Track Attendance

The attendance status set for each student is associated with a percentage value. Statuses include present and on time, not present, late, and unmarked (excused absence).

Graded Attendance

The Attendance tool also creates an assignment in the Gradebook and calculates attendance as a percentage of a student's grade.

If you do not want Attendance to factor into the final grade:

1. Navigate to Assignments from the course navigation menu.

2. Click the Roll Call Attendance assignment.

3. Click Edit Assignment Settings on the right-hand side.

4. Choose Do not count this assignment toward the final grade.

5. Click Save.

If you do want Attendance to factor into the final grade:

View Gradebook Scores

The Attendance Gradebook column will update every time you take roll call in the Attendance tool. In the Gradebook Attendance column, by default Canvas displays the assignment based on percentage of the point value. For instance, if the point value is 100, and roll call has been taken twice, a student with one present value (100%) and one lateness value (calculated at 80%) will have a score of 90 points, or 90%.

Lateness Value

By default, the value of being late is 80% of the present value. So if a student is late, the student will receive 80% for the day instead of the full 100%. The late value can be adjusted in Roll Call settings.

Export Attendance Reports

At both the account and course levels, the Attendance tool allows users to create attendance reports. Within the Roll call interface, the gear icon located in the upper right corner allows you to manage roll call settings and generate attendance reports based on the parameters you input. Once generated, you may choose to print your attendance reports.

Additional Resources

• How do I use the Roll Call Attendance tool in a course?

• How do I edit the Roll Call Attendance assignment?

• How do I create a roll call seating chart using the Attendance tool?

• How do I run Roll Call Attendance reports in a course?