canvas-parent

This skill should be used when the user asks about Canvas LMS data — their own student account or any observed student. Triggers on phrases like "check Canvas", "what's my grade", "Canvas inbox", "what's due", "missing assignments", "Canvas LMS", "Instructure", "course announcements", "syllabus", or any request about courses, assignments, grades, conversations, announcements, planner items, or files in Canvas.

canvas-parent-mcp

MCP server for Canvas LMS (Instructure) — read courses, grades, assignments, announcements, planner items, and conversations; download course files. Mirrors the parent/observer scope of the sibling infinitecampus-mcp.

• npm: npmjs.com/package/canvas-parent-mcp
• Source: github.com/chrischall/canvas-parent-mcp

Setup

Option A — npx (recommended)

Add to .mcp.json in your project or ~/.claude/mcp.json:

json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "canvas": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "canvas-parent-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "CANVAS_BASE_URL": "https://cms.instructure.com"
      }
    }
  }
}

With the fetchproxy extension installed and a signed-in Canvas tab, that's enough — the MCP reads your session cookies at startup. Add CANVAS_TOKEN, CANVAS_CLIENT_*/CANVAS_REFRESH_TOKEN, or CANVAS_USERNAME/CANVAS_PASSWORD to the env block if you'd rather use one of those modes.

Option B — from source

bash

git clone https://github.com/chrischall/canvas-parent-mcp
cd canvas-parent-mcp
npm install && npm run build

Authentication

fetchproxy fallback (recommended, zero-config). Set only CANVAS_BASE_URL. Install the fetchproxy browser extension, sign into your Canvas instance once. The MCP reads canvas_session + pseudonym_credentials cookies from your tab at startup; all API calls go directly from Node after that. Works with any auth flow (SSO/SAML/2FA included).

Alternatives (env-var)

• Personal access token — set CANVAS_TOKEN. Most institutions have disabled this for non-admins.
• OAuth — set CANVAS_CLIENT_ID, CANVAS_CLIENT_SECRET, CANVAS_REFRESH_TOKEN. Bootstrap via canvas-parent-mcp-qr-login.
• Username/password (session-scrape) — set CANVAS_USERNAME + CANVAS_PASSWORD. Direct Canvas accounts only (no SSO/2FA). Brittle.

Precedence when multiple are set: CANVAS_TOKEN > username/password > OAuth > fetchproxy. Set CANVAS_DISABLE_FETCHPROXY=1 to opt out of the fallback.

Tools (prefix canvas_)

Profile & observees

• canvas_get_profile — your Canvas profile
• canvas_healthcheck — which auth path resolved and whether Canvas accepts it; registered even when auth is unconfigured, so it can say why
• canvas_list_observees — students linked to your observer account

Courses

• canvas_list_courses — your active courses with grades
• canvas_get_course(courseId, view?) — course detail with syllabus + teachers

Assignments & submissions

• canvas_list_assignments(courseId) — assignments in a course
• canvas_list_missing_submissions — past-due unsubmitted work
• canvas_get_submission(courseId, assignmentId, view?) — your submission with comments + rubric
• canvas_list_recent_submissions(courseId, view?) — recently graded submissions (default 14d)

Grades

• canvas_list_enrollments — per-course grades

Calendar & planner

• canvas_list_calendar_events — calendar events / assignments
• canvas_list_upcoming_events — server-curated next 7 days
• canvas_list_planner_items — unified to-do feed

Communication

• canvas_list_announcements(contextCodes, view?) — course announcements
• canvas_list_conversations — inbox
• canvas_get_conversation(id, view?) — full conversation thread
• canvas_list_discussion_topics(courseId, view?) — course discussion topics

Files

• canvas_list_course_files(courseId) — file metadata
• canvas_download_file(url, destinationPath) — download a file to disk

Response shape (view)

Nine tools take view: "compact" | "full", and compact is the default — you get the slim shape without asking for it:

canvas_get_profile, canvas_list_observees, canvas_get_course, canvas_get_submission, canvas_list_recent_submissions, canvas_list_announcements, canvas_list_conversations, canvas_get_conversation, canvas_list_discussion_topics.

Compact here is media stripping, not a field projection — do not expect a field list. It removes the avatar URLs Canvas hangs on user objects (avatar_url, avatar_image_url) and nothing else. This server hands back Canvas's payload verbatim and holds no verified record of which of Canvas's fields a caller needs, so it does not claim to keep some and drop others: a record that came back with holes in it would read exactly like a verified answer. Stripping is subtractive, so it cannot lose a field nobody knew about. A conversation participant keeps their name and id on compact; they lose their picture.

• The link fields survive both rungs, named explicitly. url, html_url and preview_url are kept by name — html_url opens the item in Canvas, preview_url renders a submission, and url is the download handle canvas_list_course_files emits and canvas_download_file consumes. On an online_url submission that url IS the student's submitted work. Without the name, a student who submitted a link ending in .png would have had their submission silently removed on the default rung.
• Both avatar spellings really do appear. One live canvas_list_conversations response carried a default avatar (…/avatar-50.png) on one participant and an uploaded, extension-less thumbnail id on another. They are dropped by NAME, so both go — not one kept and one lost depending on whether that person ever uploaded a photo.

Pass view: "full" when you want Canvas's payload untouched, avatars and all. That is also why there is deliberately no raw rung: there is no normalisation layer here for full to sit above, so full already IS the untouched upstream payload and a third value would silently alias it.

The other ten tools take no view, for two different reasons:

• Nothing to strip. canvas_list_courses, canvas_list_assignments, canvas_list_missing_submissions, canvas_list_enrollments, canvas_list_calendar_events, canvas_list_upcoming_events and canvas_list_planner_items embed no user object — a live canvas_list_courses over twelve courses carried no media field of any kind — and a knob that does not turn is worse than no knob. canvas_healthcheck returns a verdict, not a record.
• The URL is the product. canvas_list_course_files and canvas_download_file exist to hand you a file URL. Compact there would not shrink the response, it would empty it.

Passing view to one of those ten is not an error and not a warning: MCP tool schemas are non-strict, so the key is dropped and you get that tool's ordinary output.

Notes

• Set CANVAS_NAME if you want a friendly label other than the host portion of the base URL.
• All read tools that target a user accept an optional observeeId parameter (defaults to self) — useful when an observer is checking on a linked student.