Introduction to WeBWorK for Students
I.
What
is WeBWorK?
WeBWorK is a system developed at
the University of Rochester that allows professors to put homework problems on
the web and allows students to submit their answers over the web. WeBWorK is currently used in over 300
colleges, universities and high schools.
WeBWorK is a grader, not a
tutor. It will give you immediate feedback on your mastery of each topic. It may
also give you hints. Research has shown that the use of WeBWorK has improved student
success by an average of half a grade in College Algebra courses at some
universities. WeBWorK requires that you
have access to the internet, nut you are not required to have access while working
out a homework set — only for downloading the set and for submitting your
answer
Students may try each homework
problem an unlimited number of times and, with each try, there is a message telling
you whether the answer is correct or not. There is no penalty for submitting
several incorrect answers to a problem before submitting the correct answer.
This allows you to find your own errors and to understand the topic of the
question better. The WeBWorK homework sets are individualized so that each
student has a different version of each problem. Many problems provide
solutions that are available for you to study after the due date.
II.
How
to use WeBWorK to do your homework
1.
Find
a computer with access to Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari or another
browser. It can be either your own or one in any of the university computer
labs.
2.
Open
the browser and go to the main WeBWorK homepage. The address is: https://webwork.as.uky.edu/webwork2/MA113F16/
3.
To
log in, fill in your username (this is the same as your LinkBlue username for
e-mail in ALL CAPS) and your password (this is initially your 8 digit
4.
UKID number), and click on the Continue button: .
5.
You should now be looking at a
page headed by the course title and term that lists the homework sets that are
available for you to work on. The first
thing you should do is to change your password.
Click on User Settings in the Main Menu.
6.
You
will be presented with the following window in which you should change your
password from the initial login password to something of your own making. Additionally, if you do not wish to receive
all email through WeBWorK through your UK email account, you can enter a new
email account in the Change Email Address.
WARNING: All email will go to
that email account. It must be and
account that you access on a daily basis.
Most communication about this course will be through email. We suggest that you use your UK email account
as all official UK announcements will be sent thereto.
When you are done with your
changes, click on Change
User Options.
7.
Click
on Homework Sets in the Main Menu and you will be presented with
a list of Homework Sets.
In the Status column, each
set is marked as open, closed, or not yet open. If the set is open, that means
that when you solve a problem, it will be counted towards your grade. If the
set is closed, you can still solve problems and get your answers checked, but
your results will not be recorded.
After the
indication of whether the set is open or closed, there is additional information
about the due date (if the set is open), or whether the answers are available
(if the set is closed). When the answers are available, you have the option of
looking at correct answers when viewing a problem.
8.
After
you have clicked on a homework set, you will see a page with a list of the
problems in the set you chose. To view and/or answer a problem, click on that
problem in the 'Problem Number' list.
9.
First
generate a hardcopy of your homework set. You can do so as follows:
Click
on Homework Sets in the Main Menu. To print out a particular set,
click in the box next to that set in the Name column, and then click Download Hardcopy for Selected Sets. You will be taken to the Hardcopy Generator page. Check that the desired
set is highlighted, and then click the Generate
Hardcopy button at
the bottom of the page. Wait for the server to generate the page, and then save
it to your computer and print a copy. We, the instructors,
cannot emphasize enough that you should always first download a hard copy of
your Homework set and work it out by hand away from the computer, or at least
think carefully about each of the problems on it. Working out a homework set in
from your computer without previous preparation leads to guessing answers and
that is not very efficient or effective.
10.
Once
you have finished working out the problems in your homework set, you can input
your answers. Click on the name of the
set (it is a hyper link) and you will see a page listing the problems in the set
(middle columns) and other information, including due date and whatever the
instructor wants to communicate to you (right column).
11.
Once
you click on a problem, you will see the text of the problem with boxes for
your answers. After working out the problem on paper, enter your answers in the
boxes and click on the Submit
Answers button. You
will want to save the paper on which you work out the problems, because this is
part of what you will need to study for quizzes and exams.
When you submit an answer, you
will be told immediately whether or not your answer is correct. If your answer
is not correct, you may try again. After you have attempted a problem, you can
use the buttons at the top of the page to go to the next problem or the
previous problem, or to see the list of problems again. If you are working on a
homework set that is already closed, you will have the option to see the
correct answer. To see the correct answer, just check the box Show correct answers and click on the Check Answers button (you do not have to
enter an answer to see the correct answer).
If your answer is marked
incorrect by the computer and you are not sure what it has read is what you
have entered, check the Answer
Preview column that
appears at the top of the page once you have submitted an answer. The computer
shows you how it is interpreting your answer.
If you want to check the status
of your problems (e.g. to double
check that your answers have been recorded), use the Prob. List button at the top of the
problem page to see the problem list page. The problem list page shows how much
credit you have for each problem that you have attempted.
When you finished working, log
out by clicking on Log
Out at the top
right corner of the page or towards the top of the left panel. All of your
answers to date will be saved. You do not
have to finish a homework set all in one sitting.
12.
There
are three links at the left of the page in the Main Menu
that are available to you at all times during a WeBWorK session.
§ Homework sets takes you to the list of
available sets (the page you saw immediately after you logged in).
§ Password/Email takes you to the page where you
can reset your password and the email address used by WeBWorK to contact you.
§ Grades takes you to a summary of your grades for WeBWorK
assignments.
§ Also available to you at all
times is an Email
instructor button,
at the bottom of every WeBWorK page.
III.
Important facts to know
o If you have a problem logging
in, contact your instructor.
o If you have a problem printing
out a set, ask a consultant at one of the computer labs. If you don’t get
sufficient help, contact your instructor.
o If you have questions on
specific homework problems or if you have comments about WeBWorK that
you think can help us make WeBWorK better, click on the 'Email
instructor' button on any of the pages of WeBWorK.