Homework With LaTeX

Given the prevalence of LaTeX in the field of physics and the online nature of the course, I decided to use the opportunity to teach my students how to use it!

Overleaf has an excellent beginner's tutorial for LaTeX (link), so I made an exercise based on it. The exercise begins with reading through the tutorial, then creating a new LaTeX project on Overleaf. In the project, students were tasked with making a document showcasing some of the basic formatting options available.

I required my students to submit their homework assignments using LaTeX. This had the dual benefit of giving them practice with the language and making their assignments easier for me to grade!

Since I couldn't expect them to spend a lot of time studying LaTeX documentation on top of their usual coursework, I created templates for their homework assignments. Each problem had a section for their work and their answer. For multi-part problems each part had its own work and answer field. While they were required to submit their assignments as a pdf with the answers typeset, I left it up to them whether they wanted to show their work with LaTeX or by including a picture of their handwritting.

Shown below is a barebones example of what the templates looked like. The screenshot on the left is the LaTeX code and the screenshot on the right is the compiled pdf.