Start early! This is one of the top pieces of advice Math 105 students from past semesters have said they would give to future Math 105 students!

Using the Practice Masteries

You can access practice masteries at any time* from here: https://instruct.math.lsa.umich.edu/courses/105/gw/index.html

*Note that practice masteries open two days before the official mastery opens in the proctored labs. For example, Practice Mastery 1 will be available 9/9/25.

After starting one practice mastery, you will need to wait 10 minutes before the system will allow you to generate another practice mastery.

The purpose of the practice masteries is to give you some familiarity with what to expect from each mastery and the chance to prepare before taking a proctored mastery. Here are some ways you might do that:

Try taking one with a friend!
Try making a list of all the relevant formulas and major ideas from the material covered in the mastery, and that have that in front of you while working on the mastery.
Try taking one under "proctor-like" conditions: no notes or help from anyone; just you, the problems, a pencil and some paper.
In addition to the solutions in the WeBWorK system, some problems have detailed solution videos on Canvas. Check them out if you're unsure about how to do a problem.

After every mastery attempt (practice or proctored), take time to learn from that attempt! That means carefully going over every problem you missed, and identifying what you did wrong and how to do the problem correctly. Did you make a computational error? Use the wrong variable name? Use the wrong formula? Have no idea where to even start? You can discuss this with a tutor in the Math Lab, your instructor, or a peer.

You can look back at previous mastery attempts (both practice and proctored) by going to the same link you use for web homework, and scrolling to the bottom of the page where assignments are listed. While looking at these attempts, you can see solutions by clicking the "Show Solutions" box above the "Preview Test" and "Check Test" buttons. You can also print out a copy of your test by clicking the "Print Test" button on the upper right. You will then get a screen with a number of options. By default, it will print your answers; if you click the appropriate boxes, it will also print the correct answers and solutions. This will generate a pdf, which you can then print, if you want.

Note that there is often more than one way to solve mastery problems, so your approach may not be wrong even if it's different from the given solution. This is why it's good to talk through your solution with someone else---a classmate, your instructor, or a tutor---to discuss your work.

Even after you've taken many practice masteries, you may still encounter a type of problem you've never seen before. Because of this, your goal should be making sure you understand the basic ideas and general concepts and principles behind the problems, not just memorizing how to do each specific problem in a step-by-step way without conceptual understanding.

Entering answers into WeBWorK

Be sure to carefully read all directions about how to format your answers.
You don't need to "simplify" or "reduce" your answers, or change fractions to decimals, etc.--you're just likely to make mistakes that way. Leave answers in exact form.
You do need to make sure you're matching variable names, including whether the variable is capitalized or lower case.
The Preview Answers button is your friend! Use it to check whether you're entering correct variables and whether you've formatted things correctly, and to see a decimal approximation for your answers.
For more tips, see the "Communicating with WeBWorK" section in the Student Guide.

Proctored Masteries

Start early!
Go over every proctored attempt the same way as described above for practice masteries--learn from each attempt in order to improve.
Remember that you need to get every part of a problem correct for it to be counted correct, and at least five of the seven questions correct in order to earn any credit for the mastery!
Your highest mastery score will be the score used for your grade. Other attempts (either from before or after that one) will not affect your grade.
If your goal is to earn an A in the course, you need credit on every mastery, and should be trying to get at least 6 (and often 7) correct on every mastery.
If you aren't able to get credit on the mastery before it closes, you will have some limited opportunities to reopen some masteries on days of your choosing using Reopen Tokens. Because you will only have a few such opportunities, you should strive to limit how much you need them.
If you are ill and unable to take proctored masteries on some of the days the mastery is available, don't come take it while ill---talk to your instructor about your options.