I'm teaching a class that meets once a week, and I've found that for this class, because it's 1-credit and not very hard, too many students wait until the night before the next meeting to start their homework, when they've forgotten what happened in class 6 days before. I want to incentivize starting (and finishing) their homework earlier than that.
I've done it manually before, checking the completion stats during the week and assigning bonus points, but I want to move away from that.
I have two thoughts - 1) using the Reduced Scoring Period, but then making the grade out of the reduced score, so people who finished before the due date functionally have bonus points. Negatives: psychologically it doesn't seem like bonus, it seems like students turning in late homework; and 2) using Achievements. I could even then theoretically make one for having 50% done by a certain date, and another for having it completely done by a certain date. Students could earn these achievements more than once, webwork would keep track of how many times they achieved it, and I could just add the bonus points on at the end, or whever I want to update grades. Also, it wouldn't have to be for bonus points, could be allowing to turn in a late assignment, or some other incentive. Negatives: I've never really used Achievements before - I'd have to figure out how to do this. Is it easy to see what achievements each student has earned and how many times? There's 20 or so in the class, so not a huge number if I have to go student by student to check, especially if I only do it a few times a semester.
Any thoughts?