A day in the life of a WeBWorK instructor

Informal instructions for using WeBWorK

Quick Overview

This document gives details on how one professor actually uses WeBWorK.

By clicking on the blue question mark image in the left part of a WeBWorK page, there may be a help page specific to the current page you're viewing. Also the WeBWorK Main Forum is a good place to go for help.

Adding Students

Adding Many Students at Once

When the course has first been created, the easiest way to do this is to obtain a spreadsheet of your student's information and then edit it so it matches the classlist file format. Be sure to give the file a .lst extension, otherwise WeBWorK won't recognize it as a classlist file. Once the file is ready, go to the File Manger to upload it. If you are a professor, there should always be a link to the File Manager in the left main menu. Hit the Browse (Choose File in WeBWorK 2.15) button and select the classlist file you prepared. Then click the Upload button.

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  File manager in the left main menu

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  File manager in the templates directory

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  Upload and Choose File Button

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  Successful upload

Once the file is uploaded, it needs to be imported into the course's classlist. This is done on the Class List Editor (there's a link to it in the main menu). Click on the Import tab and select the file you just imported in the drop down menu. (If you don't see the file, you neglected to give it .lst extension.) Make sure that it says "adding any new users". Then press the Take Action button to import it.

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  Classlist editor in the left main menu

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  Classlist editor view

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  Succesful import of new students

Adding a Few Students

If there are only a few students in a class, or you need to add one student after the main classlist file was already imported, there is another feature which may be easier to use. If you click on Classlist Editor, on that page there is an Add tab. Check on it and fill in however many students you wish to add to the course and click on that hit Take Action to go to the Add Users page.

Fill in the information for each student. The only required fields are the Student ID and the Login Name, but the first and last name should probably be filled in, and if there is no email address, the student will not receive emails. (Don't worry if you don't have the email address though, the student is able to enter or change this on his own.) The "Section" and "Recitation" fields may be useful in very large classes since these options can be used to sort students in various parts of the course, such as scoring.

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  Select the Add tab

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  Fill in student information

Creating a Problem Set

Perhaps the most important part of having a successful course is creating good problem sets. You want the problems to correctly reflect the topics that are discussed in class, and to have the appropriate difficulty level. Thus, creating a problem set is one of the most important steps in maintaining a successful WeBWorK course. Creating problem sets can also be very time consuming, so be sure to give yourself plenty of time.

Very few WeBWorK professors write their own problems. Most subject material in courses that are well suited to WeBWorK has already been covered by previous WeBWorK professors, and there is no need to reinvent the wheel. But if you are writing new problems see below "Writing New Problems or Editing Current Ones".

Selecting and Adding Problems to a Set

First, go to the Library Browser (from the link in the left main menu). The uppermost section is to choose which problem set the newly selected problems will be added to. You can also create a new problem set from here by giving it a name and clicking Create a New Set in This Course.

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  Library Browser in the left main menu

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  Create a new set if necessary

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  Successfull creation

The next section is to choose which library to look at. Pick one of the libraries and then in the third section from the top choose one of the directories, or if it is set up so the menus are for subject and chapter make the according choices. There is an effort underway to make the problem libraries more accessible by subject and chapter, but even if the library is only organized by directory, the name of the directory is often enough to find the proper subject material. See also: Problem Libraries.

After making your choices from the menu(s) you can either change the display mode or the number of problems per page (more problems per page makes it longer to load the page) and then press the View Problems button. There should now be problems visible below all the tools.

Before you start marking problems, make sure the set you wish to add problems to is displayed on the menu in the first section. If you are creating a new set, type in the blank and press the "Create a New Set in This Course" button (There is no need to put the word "set" in front of the name, it is automatic on the new system) and then make sure this new set name is displayed in the menu next to the words "Adding Problems to Target Set:".

You are then ready to go through the problems and mark the ones you want to add. When you press the "Update" button all the problems marked to add or to not display do so. The other buttons in the lowest section are fairly self explanatory. The "Rerandomize" button changes the problem seed for the problems, which is what determines what the variables are.

Do not worry what order the problems are added in, or if you accidentally add a problem you didn't want, you'll get a chance to fix that later. You can change which problems you're viewing using the method described above, and add as many as you want to to a set.

Adding Problems to a Set in WeBWorK 2.15

Click on Add in order to add a problem to the selected Target Set. Note the upper right corner of the displayed problems. If it says (in target set) the problem was added successfully. Further stats of the problem and buttons for rerandomizing and trying out the problem are shown in the upper right corner.

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  Libray browser showing the first search result

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  Library problem stats

Editing an Existing Problem Set

To edit an existing problem set, go to the Hmwk Sets Editor (in the main menu). You will see a list of your homework sets; click on the pencil icon next to a set's name, and then click on the set's name in order to edit it.

The Open Date is when the problems will become available to those assigned them. Between the Open Date and the Due Date (Close Date in WeBWorK 2.15), the problems answers will be recorded. After the Due Date, no new answers will be recorded. The answers will become visible to students after the Answer Date. These three dates must be sequential. In order to adapt the dates, click on the calendar symbols and confirm your selection by clicking Take Action!.

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  Hmwk Sets Editor menu entry

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  View of the Hmwk sets Editor

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  Changing the dates of a set

Editing Set Details

In the Hmwk Sets Editor' click on the name of the set in the table colum Edit Set to be forwarded to the Set Detail for this set. You can also change the set specific dates on this page.

The set header file is what is displayed in the right hand column on the set's page. The system default is a good template as to what should be on that page. The easiest way to make your own for the set, is to click on the link on this page, or the one displayed when you view the set later (there will be a link entitled "edit" on the set header, visible to all professors). After changing these things press the Save Changes button.

Once all the dates have been saved, click on the "Edit the list of problems in this set" link (in WeBWorK 2.15 this information is located on the same page). This page can also be accessed by going to the Hmwk Sets Editor and clicking on the link in the (Edit) Problems column of that problem set's row at the bottom of the page. If you want to view the problems, change the display mode from "None" to "images" (selected by default in WeBWorK 2.15) or whichever you want, and press the Refresh button ('Render All button in WeBWorK 2.15).

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  Set detail page for homework set

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  Edit header informatiohn

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  Problem view section

The order of problems can be changed by changing the numbers in the menus in the upper left hand corner of each problem's box. To delete check the box, but if you accidentally delete one, you'll have to go back to the Library Browser Page and find it's original location to add it back again. The weight refers to how much the problem counts when scored, this is usually left at one unless there is a "practice" set at the beginning of a course to get the students used to WeBWorK and then professors often set it to 0. Usually students are allowed an unlimited (write "unlim" ("unlimited" in WeBWorK 2.15) in the box) amount of attempts at a problem, but sometimes, if the problems are multiple choice, a professor wants to limit how many times a student can try (Students have a bad habit of guessing on multiple choice problems). When you wish to save changes made to the set, scroll down to the bottom of the page and press the Save (Problem) Changes button.

In order for you to transfer this problem set's data to another course or to your local machine, it must be exported to a .def file. But don't export the file using the "Export Set" button until you are done editing the set. Once the set is exported it can be transferred from the File Manager to your local machine. If having transferred them to your machine you wish to edit them there, or perhaps understand what they consist of, see Set Definition Files.

Exporting Homework Sets in WeBWorK 2.15

Go to the Hmwk Sets Editor page and select the Export tab. Specify which sets you want to export either by exporting visible sets or checking them manually using the option selected sets. Finally, press Take Action!.

Adding Students to a Problem Set

Go to the Hmwk Sets Editor page, in the table at the bottom of the page, click on the link in the "(Edit) Assigned Users" column of the set's row. To assign the set to all users, press the button marked as such. To assign to some subset of users, check the ones to be assigned and press the Save button. Be careful not to uncheck anybody who's already started since the student's scores will be lost.

Making a Set Visible to Students

The default for new sets is "invisible", this makes it so students can't see what you're working on. Once everything is ready for the students to see you want to make the sets "visible". To do this go to the Hmwk Sets Editor and click on the pencil next to the set's name and then check the "visible" checkbox and press the "Take Action" button.

Scoring a Problem Set

You can do scoring from the web. Go to the Scoring Tools. You can either score one set at a time, or get a total score for all the sets. To score one set select it and press the "Score Selected Set(s)" button. To score multiple sets, highlight them and press the button, this will create a "totals" file which combines the scores from all of the sets to give final scores, if the checkbox is checked, then the regular files for each individual set are created also. The scoring procedure creates files (in .csv format) that include the status of the problems, the number of attempts, and also the final score of the problems.

You can download these different files onto your personal computer clicking on the file names on this page, or from the File Manager.

You should realize that scoring a problem set is like writing grades into your grading book, once the grades are entered they are fixed unless you change them. Whatever a student does after a set has been scored, does not effect the scoring files.

There is no standard procedure of when to do scoring. You have a few options:

• You can score each problem set right after the problem set is due. This way, you can email your students their homework grades throughout the semester. The trouble with this is that if you gave a student an extension but scored the set before the student completed the set, anything the student did after you scored the set would not be recorded. Once the student has completed the set, you would have to edit the scoring files accordingly by hand.

• You can score all of the problem sets at the end of the semester. This way, there are no problems with extensions and no major editing needs to be done. The drawback is that you wouldn't be able to send emails to your students.

• The final option is a combination of the other options above. You can score each problem set right after the problem set is due, email your students if you want, and then score once more at the end of the semester. Scoring a set just appends the scores to the totals file so if you score a set twice, it will appear twice in the totals file. Thus, if you do this, you would have to use the totals file accordingly.

It should be noted that the first time a scoring file is created, student names, sections, and recitations will be taken from the current classlist information. If you score a set after that, the new information is appended to that scoring file by matching student ID's. If you change a student's recitation (or name, etc) but keep their student ID, the new recitation will not be written in that scoring file. If students add or drop the course, this will be handled automatically.

Also, it's easy to use e.g. excel to add exam grades to the scoring file.

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  Menu entry for scoring tools

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  Scoring tools page

See Scoring for more information on scoring.

Sending Email to Students

Sometimes, after you score problem sets, you may want to send your students an email discussing their scores. Other times you may want to send an email to students with general announcements about your course. This can be accomplished on the Email page, which allows you to send personalized emails. When sending mail from the email page, make sure all the fields which originally contain "FIXME" are changed. The email can be sent to all, or any subset of the students.

The personalized variables can be viewed by clicking on the "list of insertable macros" drop down menu. They are:

• $FN - first name
• $LN - last name
• $SID - student ID number
• $SECTION - student's section
• $RECITATION - student's recitation
• $STATUS - C, drop, withdrawl, audit, etc.
• $EMAIL - student's email address
• $LOGIN - student's login name
• $COL[3] - third column in merge file
• $COL[-1] - last column in merge file

Any value is accepted for $COL[ ], but values that are out of range of the merge file will produce no output.

Here is a copy of a typical email :

Dear $FN,

This email message should go to everyone in mth141 for whom I have
an email address.

NEW WEBWORK ASSIGNMENT:

A new WeBWorK assignment (assignment 8) covering the material from
this week's lectures is up on the WeBWorK system.  It must be completed
by 2:00am Tuesday, November 5.  Remember, assignment 7  must be completed
by 2:00am Tuesday, October 29.



YOUR RECENT SCORES:

Your score on WeBWorK assignment 5 was $COL[-3] points out of a
possible 15 points.  Your score on WeBWorK assignment 6 was $COL[-1]
points out of a possible 10 points. Your score on Exam 2 was $COL[-2]
points out of a possible 100 points.

These scores should include any adjustments I have made. If there are
any errors in these scores, please see me.

Have an enjoyable weekend.

Professor Pizer

Now you can send a "personalized" email to your students by merging the above with (for example) the mth141_totals.csv file (the scoring file from assignment 5). Be sure to set the merge file in the drop down menu in the upper right hand corner.

Usually you want to be really careful, so you can first preview the email by selecting some student in the drop down menu and clicking on the "Preview" button. This allows you to read the email with all the variables filled in for that student.

To save your self future work, you may want to save one email to use as a template for other emails. You can save as many as you want, but the one you save as "default" is the one that appears when you first go to the screen so that should be the template you use most often.

Viewing Student Progress

First student did not attempt any of the problems (blue dots), second student achieved 100% in the first problem after 4 tries and 0% of the third problem after 2 tries

Student progress can be viewed by going to the Student Progress page, a link to which is in the main menu. You can either view the statistics on one set for all users, or all sets for one user. This is a good place to find out how an individual student is doing in the course, or to find out how the class as a whole is doing on a particular set.

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  Student progress menu entry

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  Student progress main view

When selecting a problem set in the Student Progress page, a table is generated showing the achieved scores of all users assigned to the set. The columns of the table read

• Score: the score that was achieved by the student
• Out Of: maximal score to be achieved in the set (sum of all weights assigned to the problems)
• Problems: A period . indicates a problem has not been attempted and a number from 0 to 100 indicates the grade earned. The number on the second line gives the number of incorrect attempts.

Success Indicator

The "ind" column is a statistical "success" indicator for the problem set, calculated as:

[math] \mathrm{ind} = \frac{\frac{\text{total correct problems}}{\text{total problems}^2}}{\text{average number of attempts per problem}} [/math]

which is a fairly good indicator of how well the students are grasping the concepts. This feature is disabled by default on WeBWorK on newer WeBWorK instances. There is still a checkbox to activate in on the Scoring Tools page.

Acting as a Student

Often when a student is having trouble with a particular problem it is helpful to see their version of the problem (since problem parameters are randomized). You can do this by going to the Instructor Tools and selecting the student and the set and click the "Act as one user on one set" button. You can enter answers into the student's problem, they will not be recorded. Once you are done "acting" as that student, be sure to click on the "Stop Acting" link in the upper left hand corner of the screen.

Changing Set Data For an Individual Student

There are many times when you need to give a student an extension on a problem set, or change their score on a problem, or change the variables of a problem for a particular student. You can accomplish this by going to the Instructor Tools page and selecting the student and the set, and then pressing the "Edit one set for users" button. To give an extension, click on override, and change the due date and answer date. If you want to give a student different variables than they currently have, click on the "Edit list of problems in this set for studentname" link at the bottom of this page. Changing the "problem seed" for a particular problem gives it different variables. The students score on a particular problem can be changed here also.

Updating Version Data on Gateway Attempt

For gateway/quiz sets the status of the problems is slightly more complicated: there is a set (e.g., "quiz01") that is assigned to every student, but it's essentially a template for the set that they actually work. The latter will have ",vN" appended for the Nth version of the quiz that is taken. If the quiz is only given once, there will be only one of these.

The result of this is that changing the status of the "quiz01" set doesn't change how the student seems to have done on the assignment—that is governed by the status of the problems on the "quiz01,v1" set. You can edit that as well, but it requires some finding because it isn't a set that appears in the list on the instructor tools or homework sets editor pages.

To update a version of a gateway/quiz for a student, you want to edit all sets assigned to the student (Instructor Tools -> View/edit all set dates for one user). That will give a list of sets including the versions of the set that the student has taken, and clicking on the version name ("quiz01,v1") will allow editing anything about it, including the status of the problems.

Changing a Password

If a student forgets his or her password, you can give them a new password. Go to the Instructor Tools page and select the student and press the "Change Password" button.

Removing Students or Changing Status

It is better to "drop" a student from a course instead of deleting them, since deleting them destroys all their data which may be needed later. In order to drop the student, go to the Classlist Editor and select the user (by checking the box next to his name in, then select the "Edit selected users" option and click the Take Action button. Just enter the word DROP or the letter D in the status box for the student classlist information. You may want to enter a comment giving the drop date. You can later resurrect the student by changing his or her status to C (for current). In that case, you may want to make sure the student has been assigned the problem sets.

Writing New Problems or Editing Current Ones

Editing a problem in WeBWorK

You may want to select problems from the text book which you want to modify into WeBWorK problems. In order to create a problem source file (i.e. a .pg file), usually you start with a PG file containing a problem similar to the one you already want and modify it. Nearly everywhere you see a problem there is a pencil icon "Edit it" link. If you click on this link you will be taken to an editor where you can edit this problem. This may not be an easy task, since this is computer code. There is a link on the editing page to the "Man pages" which can help you learn to write and edit problems.

For more on writing problems, see Category:Authors.

If you are editing a problem that's in one of your homework sets and that you got from a library, chances are that the problem is protected and you can't modify it. You can use the blue "Report Bugs in this Problem" button if you find a mistake in the problem. (The first time you do this, you need to create an account at the Bugzilla website that appears.)

If you want to create your own corrected version of the problem: make some changes to the problem code, then use the option "NewVersion" that's shown underneath the problem code box, choose append or replace, and click on "Take Action!". That will create a copy of the problem in your local library in the Library Browser and add it to the current homework set. Make some changes to the problem code, then choose the option "Update" and "Take Action!".

When writing your own problems, you will usually have a few errors here and there. It is usually a good idea to choose "View" and "Take Action!" often to preview the problem and make sure that it is working.

Writing totally new problems may be difficult for a newer professor to do, but if you just want to change the wording or the variable parameters, it may be worth the time to make the small changes and save that problem to a new directory. Perhaps the best way to learn how the problems are written is making small changes to a bunch of them.

Standalone Renderer

Editing a problem with the standalone renderer

You may want to write a new problems on your local machine. To this end, you can use the Standalone Renderer (not part of WeBWorK but an additional program) and then upload your problem using the file manager.