Making WeBWorK Work for your course

• If you do use WW make all your home work WW based. Students won't pay attention to other assignments.

• Make the WW assignments a significant part of your grade. (Suggestion: 40%)

• It simply does not work to fix a problem with a WW question - like it haveing the wrong answer - after your class has been exposed to the set. Instead, if there is a problem with a webwork question let the students know and have WW give all of them credit for that problem. Apologize profusely.

• It is possible to have different (random) numbers for parameters in each students' problem. This feature is overrated. It is better to settle on a specific set of well thought out parameters that keep the required arithmetic at the appropriate level. This also makes it easier to communicate with the class as a whole about the problem.

• Instructors are sometimes worried about WW assignments being answered by people other than their student. Students who cheat only cheat themselves by depriving themselves of the learning affect. Ignore them.

• Assignments should be wordy, with examples and explanations, and links to relevant web pages where appropriate.

• The greatest source of frustrations and wasted energy is the fact that students new to WW don't understand arithmetic precedence. They think 1/x+y means 1/(x+y). It is well worth it to spend time, and perhaps the entire first assignment, on explaining these issues.

• Make sure your students understand that upper and lower case variables are distinct.

• Have your first assignment due at least two weeks into the semester, to allow for late comers.

• Use and update the "message of the day" that goes with your class. (Note: this can be found in the file motd.txt in the templates directory for your course.)

• Encourage your students to work together on WW home works.

• Take care to use hw sets where problems cover a wide range of difficulty. It's OK to have a lot of routine problems and a few difficult ones.

• Don't "bad mouth" WeBWorK to any of the students. Despite your real feelings about it, bad mouthing it will make it even more unpleasant for everyone and will make the students even more frustrated. If you don't like WeBWorK, just don't use it in the future.