Creating Newsletters with Canva
Check out Mr. Unger’s Tiger Weekly and Ms. Webb’s High School Newsletter to see some of what Smore is capable of.
Smore DOES have a free plan, but it locks quite a bit of the functionality behind a payment plan.
Soooo where does that leave us? We can actually use Canva to do some really nice newsletters! This allows you to use a platform that works for more design tasks (meaning you don’t have to learn different tools), and you have free access to all of the premium tools when using your school account.
Let’s Do it!
First, it would make sense to look at a newsletter template. This DOES make sense, but these template are more similar to the old, paper type of newsletter. There are some great templates, and if you want your newsletter to be printable, then this is your best starting point.
The biggest issue with the newsletter template is the vertical size of it. If you have a lot going on, a single 8 1/2" isn’t going to be all that easy to use. Sure, you can use multiple pages, but that puts a page brake and consequently, a visual break in your news. If you just need a little more height to your page, check out the infographic templates!
Cool, so we have two options so far, but MAYBE we want to be just that little bit different… that little bit extra… Maybe we want our digital newsletter to feel more, you know, DIGITAL!
Because this is what I’m looking for in this demo, I’m going to use the “website” template. It is a bit annoying that there isn’t a blank version of this, so either find a template that you like as a starting point, or just pick a random one that you can delete all of the contents of.
For this demo, I’m using the template called:
“Digital Noticeboard Teacher Education Website in Yellow Purple Colorful Lined Style”
The cool thing about the website layout is that pages are basically equal to slides. Moving from page to page has animated transition effects instead of just scrolling. When I add a page by clicking on this button, I’ll get a new blank page after the currently visible page.
Templates usually provide pretty reasonable instructions on what to do, for example, I can double-click on this bubble, and add the information that I’m instructed to. Or, I can change it to whatever I think makes sense!
I don’t like this background on the first “page” or section. To change it, I’ll go to my uploads on the left, and I’ll click on a photo that I would like to use. If I don’t already have an image, I can also use the “elements” option to search for free image options.
Now I’ve got a picture, but it clearly isn’t a background image.
Let’s right click on the image, and then click on “Replace background.”
Cool! Now I have a fancy background on this first page! I’ve created another problem though. I can’t really read the title text.
I’m going to click on the title, then I’ll click on the font color option to bring up the left toolbar.
In the toolbar, I’ll click the font color, I’m going to try white.
Well… That’s easier, I guess, but it is still not great. Let’s add an effect to try and bring the text “forward” on the image.
On my top toolbar, I’ll click on “Effects” to get my left toolbar.
Conveniently, in the effects toolbar, there is an option called “Lift.” I’ll click that.
Great! Now the text is easier to read, and it kind of stands up on the page.
While I’m here, I’ll just rename the title.
Something else that you would expect from a digital newsletter is the ability to click on things and be taken to new locations on the web. Maybe you want to link to the school website, this week’s lunch menu, or maybe your Clever page. I’m going to link to the percussion “Band” app.
I’ll click on the button/bubble/asset that I want to turn into a link, and then I’ll click the three dots above it.
In this expanded menu, I’ll click on “Link.” I’ll also make a mental (or physical) note that I can also hold down my control key and press K to get to the same thing in the future).
That opened the link tool, so all I have to do is pate in the link the location I want my students to visit. Then I’ll hit done.
By default, this is going to underline the text, and that is totally fine, but I don’t like it here. I still have the “button” selected, so I’ll click on the underline font button to disable it.
Much better! Now it looks a lot more like a button you would find on a website.
At this point, I’ll continue going through the template, adding, removing, and editing the elements to make my newsletter look the way I want (except I totally didn’t do that for the sake of the demo).
That brings us to sharing! What good is a newsletter if nobody sees it!?!? I’ll click on the “Share” button to option the options.
Now, I’ll choice the “Public view link” option.
This gives me YET ANOTHER window, and I’ll click on “Create public view link.”
Now I can click on the convenient “Copy link” option, and my link is ready to paste into an email or Google Classroom, or wherever else I might think of.
Now, if I click where the visitor label is, I’ll get the analytics window.
This shows several stats on views. This might not be critical, but it is nice to see if you are talking to yourself or not!
If you get to a point where you no longer want the newsletter to be public, you can click on Share > Public view link, and then click the three little dots to remove your link. Easy!
Click here to view my demo newsletter!
Well, that’s pretty much it! You can use these same techniques in all of your other Canva design projects, so don’t think that this information HAS to be used just for newsletters. I used exactly the same techniques to make the title thumbnail for this post. PLUS, I used Canva’s stupid-good background removal tool. One click, and we are background free!
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