The Hypothesis digital annotation tool allows groups to collaboratively annotate readings, highlighting and adding comments, questions, and learning resources directly to specific passages within the reading itself.
This article provides steps for getting started through the Hypothesis website. If you are looking for the Canvas integration see Hypothesis: Getting Started with Annotation Assignments in Canvas.
Get Started
- Navigate to the Get Started page on the Hypothesis website.
- Click Create A Free Account to create your account.
- Follow the instructions on the Get Started page to add the Hypothesis bookmarklet to your browser. This step will ensure that you can annotate webpages and other web-hosted texts.
- Navigate to a webpage or PDF that you want to annotate and click the Hypothesis browser extension or bookmarklet. You may need to log in to annotate. You should be able to see others’ Public annotations on that page and add your own.
- Use your cursor and mouse to highlight text on the page or document and click the Annotate button that appears. You can also interact with others’ Public annotations, or the annotations of people in your private groups (e.g., students in your class).
Note: You can annotate publicly, privately, or within a group. For annotation assignments in a class, we recommend that you use Hypothesis within Canvas to automatically create a group or create a private group for your class through the website.
Using groups for annotations
To create a private annotation group for your class outside of Canvas:
- Go to the Hypothesis website and log in with your credentials. Your annotation dashboard will appear.
- Click the Groups link at the top right corner of the dashboard, and select Create New Group.
- Give the group a name and description and click Create Group.
- Once you have created the group, you can share the Invite New Members link with your students and they can join your private group. Be sure to tell students that, when they want to annotate to the class group, they should be sure to select the name of your group at the top of their Hypothesis dashboard before annotating. Send students these instructions for Annotating With Groups.
Teaching & Learning with Hypothesis
How can I get additional help?
For technical support, submit a ticket with Hypothesis. For pedagogical support for Hypothesis or annotation tools, schedule a consultation with a DLINQ team member.