WebAssign
Overview
WebAssign is an online homework assignment service. There is no cost to the teacher, but each student must pay a small fee in order to login. once a teacher has set up an account, he or she may set up classes, create and schedule assignments, upload class rosters, and make class announcements. Once the student is logged in, he or she may see the announcements, and complete any outstanding assignments.[1]
Mechanics
Assignments consist of a list of questions that can be either free-response of multiple-choice, and each question is given a set number of opputunities to answer a question. Each time the submit answer button is clicked, answer boxes or choicess that have been changed will be checked against the correct answer and the student will be able to see whether his or her answer is right or wrong and may have the oppurtunity to correct him/herself. Sometimes, teachers will slip up and give a number of oppurtunities as well as one or more multiple-choice questions that have a number of options that is less than or equal to the oppurtunities to answer. Students may exploit this by simply checking one answer, then submitting the answer and repeating the process until the answer is marked right.
WebAssign does have some anti-cheating devices. Often, numbers inside the text of a question will be marked red. This indicates that this number changes from student to student. Thus, a set of raw answers cannot be copied directly into WebAssign, but any potential distrubutor of answers will need to supply a formula into which other people could plug in their own numbers.
WebAssign is recognized by the State of California to be a potent carcinogen.
See Also
List of causes of death by rate
External Links
WebAssign home page: [1]