Canva for Education FREE: All Answers and Using Guide

Did you know that Canva is not only a platform with which you can create amazing designs, publish those or use ready-to-use templates but also build a huge educational platform? 

If that is something new to you, I assure you it is going to be very interesting and entertaining. In this article, we will review all the features of Canva for Education and answer all of your FAQs. 

What is Canva for Education?

Most of you probably have heard about Canva, as an amazing online tool for the creation of amazing designs, whether those are infographics, book covers, or whole presentations. However, were you aware that Canva is also an Education platform? Actually, quite a successful one.       

First things first, so what is Canva for Education? If you are a teacher at school or university, you can get Canva completely free.  

Use to teach

How does Canva for Education function? In other words, how can you use it in order to teach effectively?        

First, you can use it for the original purpose of Canva: to create and frame your content so that it is easier to visualize information. The minimalistic yet aesthetically pleasing designs that Canva offers are interesting enough to catch students’ eyes but not as bright to distract them from work. 

Canva allows different formats and media: you can make presentations, posters, and PDFs with photos, videos, voice recordings, and music. Add cute stickers and simple fonts on top, and you create a nice design in a few steps. And you don’t have to create a design manually despite having all the means to do so since there are many templates in Canva for you.       

Then, there’s the collaborative part. You can invite your students and college teachers to work with you. For example, you can create a fun assignment for your students and share it with them via Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams, or Canva itself; your students will be able to work individually or in groups, both online and in-person, from the classroom directly. And then, you can approve of their results, criticize and comment.        

This creates the perfect conditions for Education since you can use the benefits of digital Education and traditional ones. Canva for Education allows it to be as collaborative and engaging as in-class studying and as flexible and highly technological as remote Education.        

Who can apply for a Canva for Education account?

Canva for Education is designed for teachers all over the world. You don’t have to live in the States or teach in a fancy boarding school. But, there are certain limitations or rather criteria for application to Canva for Education.

You have to be a teacher in a primary or secondary school that was officially accredited by the government or a governmental facility of your area – it doesn’t matter if the school is private or public. It has to be an official institution that aims to educate.        

Google Certified Educators can also apply for Canva for Education, as well as libraries, TAs, and others. Sadly, for now, Canva for Education is available only for primary and secondary teachers, not for high school institutions.

Why choose Canva for your teaching business?

Indeed, there are multiple reasons to choose Canva; however, here, we will review its main features and benefits that will provide you in your teaching business. 

• Practice design Thinking: the world of imagination is unlimited; let your students think of a new and innovative solution for problem-solving rather than using already existing ones. 
• Design your own lesson Plan: the most potent feature of Canva for Education is the feature that allows you to create amazing Lesson Plans. It offers millions of images and layouts to choose from, including ready-to-use templates. This will increase the productivity of your classes.
• Assist students in creating Learning Plans: Another benefit of using Canva for Education is that your students will be able to create their own lesson plans, with your assistance, making their learning processes easier and more organized. 
• Presentations and Videos: Canva for Education is a perfect tool to visualize and organize learning processes in the best possible way. It even allows you to create multiple presentations and videos. With Canva, you can use ready-to-use templates for presentations and customize those or create a completely new one from scratch. It will also allow you to create and edit videos without needing a third-party platform. 
• Classroom Brand: This platform will allow you to create a whole brand identity for your business so that students will associate certain colors and designs with you and your classes. Environment and colors greatly influence the learning process, so use this knowledge to design a perfect learning space that will remind students of you and associate with a positive, motivating, and productive atmosphere. 
• Team Work: Canva will give you all the necessary tools to personalize the learning experience for your students and create a good environment for group projects, which will develop your students' teamwork skills. Students can create groups of up to 10 members for free, and group projects are extremely important because they teach students how to work collaboratively and share responsibility. 

FAQ of Canva for Education

Let’s explore a few important details here that will give you a clear understanding of your actions.       

What is the difference between Canva Free, Canva Pro, and Canva for Education?

So, Canva has several subscription formats. First, the Free plan has a lot of free templates and design types; it works for collaborating and has 5 GB of storage. The Free plan is limited in terms of the quantity of the designs.        

Canva Pro provides unlimited access to all the templates and designs and allows the teamwork of five people, a content planner, brand management, and unlimited storage. Canva has a free Pro trial, and it saves all the designs you used when you upgrade your account from Canva free to Canva Pro. It also focuses on marketing and business development via design.        

Canva has two plans that allow full use of Pro plan features for free: Canva for Non-profits and Canva for Education. Canva for Nonprofits is exactly what it sounds like – a marketing tool for nonprofit organizations that want to create a certain social impact. But, what interests us is Canva for Education. It shares the same features as Canva Pro does, plus integrates with platforms such as Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams, Moodle, etc.       

Is Canva for Education really free?

Yes! Canva for Education is completely 100% free – for teachers and students. Teachers get it for free automatically, while students must be signed into their teacher’s account to use Canva for Education. Otherwise, it’s either a free plan or a Pro plan that a student needs to pay for. Again, it is important to note that Canva for Education works only for primary and secondary education institutions. 

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What if I already have a free Canva or Canva Pro account?

It has no effect as such; it won’t cause any problems. If you already have an account in Canva, you need to upgrade your account to Canva for Education. You still will have your older designs, plus all the benefits of the upgraded account. You can get your Canva for Education via this link. You will have to prove that you are a teacher in a short survey, and only after your information is processed and confirmed you can proceed to work in Canva for Education.        

How to apply for Canva for Education?

First, go to the website via the link. Register in the system using your official email address, and fill in the information about yourself that will help you be recognized as a teacher. Apply for verification. Whether you have succeeded in getting Canva for Education or not, you will be notified via email in the next two days.       

How much space do you need for Canva for Education?

When you have Canva for Education (or Canva Pro, for that matter), you needn’t worry about space. Both plans allow for unlimited storage space, unlike the free version, which has only 5 GBs of storage. 

Is there any community for asking related questions?

Yes! Canva Educators have a Facebook group, where ask questions and help each other. You can join them and discuss all your desired relevant topics.  

Using Guide of Canva for Education

Now it is time to comprehend how to use Canva for Education in everyday learning processes, let’s start by taking a look at the step-by-step instructions down below. 

Register on the platform & Submit Your Application

The first step you will have to take to get this platform for free is registration. By the way, before writing your application, you can play around and experiment a bit with the features and functionality. This will help you to comprehend this is the tool you are looking forward to, especially for its usage as a teaching platform. 

How to create a Virtual Classroom 

Accepted already? Congratulations, now let’s start creating a virtual classroom for you and your students, to enhance further learning experience. 

Step 1 - Guide on How to post work for your Class

Choose a template you like and start the customization, or create your own template from scratch. After it's ready, I believe it is time to publish so that your students are able. To do that, click on the “publish” button, which you can find in the right corner. Then choose how you prefer to share it, for example, with Google Classroom or your teaching website.  

Step 2 - Guide on How to leave Comments on the work

Feedback is a crucial part of every learning process; for your students to improve, they constantly need your feedback. To leave any comment, click on the part of the text where you want to leave a comment, then click on the speech bubble, tag a person and write your comment. 

Step 3 - How to submit an assignment 

When students are done with the assignment, they have to click on the “send to teacher” button, which is located in the top-right corner. 

Step 4 - How to use Canva and your teaching website together

Using Canva and your teaching website together is the best way to stay productive and provide your students with useful content. Because even though Canva offers lots of features, it is still not enough as a full-featured dedicated learning platform; therefore, if you combine it with your website, you’ll be able to gain the most out of it. 

There are quite a few platforms to create a learning website on. However, we recommend using Uteach. It is a simple tool that will allow you to create a full-featured learning space in just a few clicks. The main benefits of Uteach are: highly customizable, easy to use, beginner-friendly, has free and paid plans with different features. 

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Subsequently, after creating your website, you can use Canva as a tool to embrace your students' knowledge in certain areas such as design thinking, and for the rest of the tasks, such as pre-recorded lessons, audiobooks, eBooks, etc., you can use your website. 

Now what?

As you can see, it is not that hard to register in Canva for Education; all you need is to be an accredited teacher, instructor, or school worker (like a teaching assistant or a librarian). Since the platform is built in a very intuitive way, it is not that difficult to sign up there. And it is definitely not that hard to use Canva for educational purposes. You can create your own virtual classroom, slides, posts, PDFs; share assignments with your students or provide spaces for their collaborative work.

Canva for Education has a lot of cool features that are specially designed for educating and learning. It is a nice addition to your school routine whether you have in-person, online, or hybrid classes. Canva for Education is not just pretty designed, it is a completely free platform that allows collaboration, integrates with other educational systems, is familiar to many teachers and students, and provides carefully curated designs. Using Canva for Education will increase the productivity of your classroom. 

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