Announcements allow instructors to communicate with students about course activities and post interesting course-related topics. Announcements are designed to allow instructors to broadcast information out to all members of a course. You have the option of sending an announcement to the entire course, or you can create sections (groups of students) and send announcements directly to specific sections.
Canvas Instructor Guide: Announcements • Announcements Video Tutorial
To create a new announcement, select "Announcements" from the left course side menu, then click the red "+ Announcement" button at the right.
Enter your desired information. You can also upload images and media to your announcements using the "Attachment" section. Under "Options" you can do things like schedule when an announcement is posted and allow interactions with it. Don't forget to click the "Publish" button at the bottom right when you're finished.
To view an announcement and any responses to it, or to edit it, just click on it from the list on the Announcements landing page.
Canvas gives you the ability to create groups of students within your course called sections. Learn how to create a section here, in the Instructor Guide.
Once you have your sections created, you can send announcement to all sections (this is the default setting), or choose to send the announcement only to selected sections. Do this by selecting the sections you want to target from the dropdown menu in the "Post to" part of the Announcement creation page.
Tech support: For technical assistance, start a ticket with WITS
Brainstorming: For ideas on how to use tools in your course, contact the DLS