The Canvas Inbox, also called Conversations, lets you message individuals, groups, or the whole class from inside the course, keeping communication in one place rather than scattered across personal email. Canvas delivers these messages to students’ notification channels, and students can reply by email, so a conversation can carry on without either of you logging in.

Due dates you set on assignments appear automatically on the course Calendar and in each student’s to-do list, which is one more reason to set dates carefully as you build. You can also add calendar events for things that are not assignments, such as a review session.