Microsoft 365 Tools

What Can I Use It For?

Microsoft 365, available to University of Toronto faculty, students, and staff, offers a variety of tools and applications, many of which can be used to support teaching and learning goals. These tools can enhance student engagement, support active and collaborative learning, and streamline common instructional tasks such as communication, content sharing, and feedback.

MS Teams provides a central space for course synchronous class meetings. OneDrive and SharePoint support secure storage and sharing of files such as course materials, and enabling collaboration on documents and group projects. Word, PowerPoint, and Excel are widely used for creating and collaborating on content and assignments. MS Forms supports low-stakes quizzes, surveys, and formative assessment.

Together, these tools allow instructors to design flexible learning activities and content that support collaboration, accessibility, and academic integrity across in-person, hybrid, and online courses.

Special Notes

Microsoft Whiteboard storage is being migrated from Azure to OneDrive with full deprecation by February 2026. Microsoft Whiteboard users must complete the migration to retain access to existing whiteboards. To migrate, launch/open your whiteboard before February 2026:

Launch an eligible Whiteboard client (Windows app, Microsoft Teams desktop/web, or web app).
This will automatically initiate the migration to OneDrive.

If you have any further questions or concerns, please submit a ticket to the Enterprise Service Centre at uoft.me/m365help

This Academic Toolbox tool helps you...

Build Your Course / Connect With Students / Design For Inclusion

Typical course activity format:

Synchronous or asynchronous

Quercus integration

Non-integrated tool

Where can I get more support?

Enterprise Service Centre - Get Help with Microsoft 365

LinkedIn Learning for Staff & Faculty at UofT

Related resources / similar tools

Microsoft 365 OneDrive integration

Microsoft 365 OneDrive Collaborations

Microsoft 365 OneDrive Assignments

Cost

Centrally funded

How to Get Started

Choose from the available applications:

Descriptions and some suggested pedagogical applications are listed below.

Instructions

Bookings

Schedule and manage appointments.

Allow students to sign up for office hours held on Microsoft Teams
Calendar

Schedule and share meeting and event times.
- Invite students to virtual class
- Invite students to meetings
- Collaborate with colleagues
Excel

Spreadsheet program. Allows you to connect to data, model and analyze it, and visualize insights. It can help determine trends, timelines, relationships and more.
- Create and collaborate on gathering and analyzing data
- Create data visualization
- Create assignment templates for Cloud Assignments submitted through Quercus
- Support teamwork and groupwork through Collaborations in Quercus
Forms
Create surveys, quizzes, and polls and see results in real time.

Create surveys

Create quizzes with feedback on correct and incorrect responses

Gather (anonymous) feedback (e.g., mid-course evaluations)

Use Microsoft Forms as a Polling Tool in a Live Session

Promote reflection and metacognition

Live Poll in PowerPoint by Integrating Microsoft Forms, for polls in in-person and synchronous online sessions

Create polls for Teams meetings

Facilitate peer review (e.g., of group presentations)

Conduct self-assessments

Add an MS Form as an add-in to PowerPoint

Practice mode (In practice mode, responders can learn at their own pace, get instant feedback after answering each question, try multiple times and get recaps after they finish the practice.)
OneDrive

Store, access, and share your files on the cloud. You can access files from any device, anywhere. Sharing your files allows you to collaborate with others.
- Store and share large files (e.g., course materials)
- Release content to selected students
- Collaborate on documents
- Add annotations to shared documents
- Create cloud (template) assignments that students can modify and submit for feedback
- Share documents and folders
Tip: Use the Microsoft OneDrive integration with Quercus to create links to OneDrive files in Modules and the Rich Content Editor.
OneNote

Organize notes in a digital notebook that can be accessed across all devices. Create sections and pages with multi-media, files, forms and more.
- Create a virtual, scrolling whiteboard for demonstrations and problem solving (Tip sheet coming soon)
- Save multimedia content
- Collaborate with others
- Collect multimedia
OneNote Class Notebook

Organize lesson plans in a formatted digital notebook with a workspace for students, and a private page for each student
- Disseminate materials: Store class materials in Content Library
- Create a course wiki: Collaborate in Collaboration Space, including group projects, peer review, posing questions
- Create private Student Notebooks (e.g., a journal or ePortfolio): View individual student work within private space and provide feedback
Tip: Use the Redirect tool to add a link to your OneNote Class Notebook to your Course Navigation menu.
Outlook

Manage emails, calendar events, tasks, and contacts using Outlook.
- Email students and colleagues
- Book classes and office hours
- Create shared calendars
PDF

Opening a PDF in SharePoint and OneDrive on the web will display the following features at the top:
PowerPoint

Design and share professional presentations. PowerPoint integrates closed captioning while presenting.
- Create and collaborate on presentations
- Include multimedia for increased engagement
- Enhance lesson with visuals
- Create posters
- Create lecture recordings and export as .mp4
- Caption presentations
- Create assignment templates for Cloud Assignments submitted through Quercus
- Support teamwork and groupwork through Collaborations in Quercus
Clipchamp

Edit and share videos for classes, meetings, presentations, and training sessions. Create a video from live event, screen recording or import videos.
- Host and share videos
- Edit existing videos
- Generate captions and edit the transcript
- Create a screen recording
Teams

Create chat- and channel- based team workspace with video and audio meetings. Note that a Team cannot be created for courses; Microsoft Teams Video meetings can be used for teaching and learning purposes without the creation of a Team.

Hold online office hours

Facilitate webinars/synchronous sessions, including group presentations and seminar discussions

Conduct group activities using breakout rooms; record breakout rooms to capture discussions and/or deliverables

Record asynchronous lectures in a “meeting of one”

Create polls in webinars/synchronous sessions
Whiteboard

Ideate and collaborate on a free-form canvas designed for pen, touch, and keyboard. It can be used on the web or in a more full-featured app
- Share in synchronous session
- Export images or share in OneNote documentation
Changes in 2026

Microsoft Whiteboard storage is being migrated from Azure to OneDrive, with full deprecation of Azure storage by February 2026. Microsoft Whiteboard users must complete the migration to retain access.
- Any user who launches an eligible Whiteboard client (Windows app, Microsoft Teams desktop/web, or web app) will automatically initiate a non-blocking migration of their Azure-stored whiteboards to OneDrive.
- Once migration is complete, users will see their boards listed under OneDrive. Boards that fail to migrate will appear in a separate Not migrated section in the board picker.
If you have any further questions or concerns, please submit a ticket to the Enterprise Service Centre at (https://uoft.me/m365help).
Word

Create, edit and collaborate on text documents. Use built-in RefWorks Citation Manager to cite sources.
- Create and collaborate on documents
- Annotate and review documents collaboratively
- Use built-in accessibility tools to write and read documents
- Support document creation for assignment submission
- Create assignment templates for Cloud Assignments submitted through Quercus
- Support teamwork and groupwork through Collaborations in Quercus
Instructions on how to create a collaborative Word document (students/multiple people can edit):
1. Log into your UofT email (mail.utoronto.ca), select the “waffle” menu in the top left corner. Navigate to an existing file in the “My files”, or select “+ Add new” and then “Word document” to create a new document:
2. To share the document, select the blue “Share ˇ” button:
3. To give other access to edit the document (ability to have multiple collaborators), you need to change the “Link settings” (cog icon) and modify the “More settings” so those with the link “Can edit”: